The Hysan legal battle: setting out what Hong Kong’s Town Planning Board can and cannot do
The long-running saga ended with victory of sorts for the Causeway Bay developer in the Court of Final Appeal
As developers across the city raced to build huge blocks to maximise their gains, the planning watchdog’s refusal to yield increasingly angered developers.
Hysan launched a judicial review against the board’s September 2010 outline zoning plans for Causeway Bay and Wan Chai, which included building height and podium height restrictions and which specified parameters for non-building areas, including provisions to improve pedestrian traffic.
The group argued that the decisions restricted its development potential in the prime Causeway Bay shopping district. However, its first legal challenge was rejected by the Court of First Instance in September 2012.
The developer was vindicated in a subsequent appeal in 2014, when three Court of Appeal judges ruled that the board had not fairly considered Hysan’s representations due to the “objective circumstances” surrounding board meetings, including their long sitting hours and the volume and technical nature of Hysan’s arguments.
