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HOUSING AND LAND
other departments. A Land Disposal Sub-Committee formulates and monitors a land sales programme, while specific sites are identified and collated in the Lands Department.
The year has not seen a particularly buoyant property market and developers have been reluctant to follow in the wake of the high land values experienced in recent years. Nevertheless, sales of industrial land continued, much of it in Kowloon Bay and Sha Tin
new town.
During the year a number of joint venture developments were initiated by the govern- ment. These included sites where a developer will construct residential accommodation, some of which is to be handed back to the government for use as staff quarters while the remainder will be available for the developer to sell on the open market. A number of sites have been developed on a joint venture basis whereby the government has obtained recreational facilities which are subsequently made available for public use.
Low rent housing is produced by the Hong Kong Housing Authority and the Hong Kong Housing Society on land granted by the government at nil or reduced premium. Both organisations also produce flats for sale, the authority via the Home Ownership Scheme, for which the land is granted at nil premium, and the society through the Urban Improvement Scheme, under which land is either acquired by private negotiation or granted by the government at full market value following resumption. Flats are also produced at below-market prices by private developers under arrangements whereby land is offered for sale on condition that a specified number of flats are produced for sale at predetermined prices to purchasers nominated by the government.
It is also government policy, in certain areas, to modify old lease conditions which restrict the development permitted on a lot, in order to allow redevelopment complying with the applicable town planning requirements. A premium – equivalent to the difference in land value between the development permitted under the existing lease and that per- missible under the new lease terms - is normally payable for any modification granted.
A premium is also payable where a lot held on an expiring non-renewable 75-year-lease is regranted to the former owners. Special arrangements have been introduced to deal with expired leases where the ownership is divided among a number of owners. In the case of the owners of property, the leases of which give them the option to renew the lease for a further term, the Crown Leases Ordinance was enacted in 1973 to impose a new Crown rent related to the rateable value of the property situated on the lot.
Important Transactions
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Important land transactions during 1982 included the sale by tender of a large site of 13 400 square metres in Connaught Road, Central District, for development as commercial accommodation with a bus terminus replacing the existing facility on the ground floor and provision being made for the Unified Hong Kong Stock Exchanges. A site in Tai Tam for private residential development will provide the government with staff accommodation and the public with recreational facilities. On the south side of Hong Kong Island there are plans to expand the increasingly popular recreational facilities at Ocean Park within an extended area reached by an extensive system of elevators leading to the headland areas of the park.
In Tuen Mun a site of approximately three hectares was sold in July for the development of a self-contained industrial estate in which provision will be made not only for industrial accommodation but also for parking areas, shops, restaurants, clinics and recreational facilities to serve the daily needs of the future workers on the estate. Landscaping requirements are included within the requirements for the development. This is the first