LAND, PUBLIC WORKS AND UTILITIES
applications involving 3 001 residential units in the urban areas were approved and in the New Territories, 27 applications involving 15 322 residential units were approved.
Survey and Mapping
The Survey and Mapping Office of the Lands Department defines and records land boundaries of land developments, providing and maintaining territory-wide survey control networks, producing maps of the territory at various scales for land administration, engineering and legal purposes, and managing a computerised land information system.
The office supports government land transactions by defining and setting out the boundaries of land for sale, grant/regrant and so on., and maintains a comprehensive record of all leasehold and government land boundaries in digital form.
The territory-wide survey control networks provide the necessary reference points for all types of land and engineering surveys. A Global Positioning System, which receives signals from satellites to fix positions based on a global co-ordinate system. known as the World Geodetic System 84, is used for establishing reference points.
Of the maps produced by the office, the 1: 1 000 scale basic topographic maps (3 000 sheets) serve as the foundation of all other mapping. Smaller-scale maps include the monochrome map series at 1: 5 000 and the coloured map series of scale ranging from 1: 20 000 to 1: 300 000. All topographic maps except the 1: 1 000 basic map series are bilingual. Guide books, tourist maps and leisure maps in the form of Countryside Series produced by the office are very popular.
The office also provides extensive cartographic services for many government departments. These include the production of coloured geological maps, thematic maps, weather forecasting plans, aeronautical charts, electoral boundary maps and pollution control maps. The office also prepares plans for land disposal, street and place naming, government gazette notices and legal purposes.
The computerised land information system allows the efficient maintenance and retrieval of the large-scale mapping and land boundary records, and the production of good quality plans. Digital maps at 1: 1 000 and 1: 20 000, which are on sale at the Land Information Centre, are widely used by government departments, public utility companies, engineering consultants and construction firms. Five more computerised mapping and survey projects were being implemented in the year to further improve the efficiency of the office in respect of map production, the setting up of the computerised mapping system, survey (mapping) intelligence system, cadastral survey plan index system and geodetic information system.
The Photogrammetric and Air Survey Section provides aerial photographs and photogrammetric mapping service for engineering design work, volumetric calculations for quarry and controlled tipping operations, environmental studies as well as town planning work. The section is also on call for record photography after storms, flooding, landslip and aircraft crashes. Photographs it takes are available for sale to the public.
The Land Survey Ordinance came into force in January 1996. Land subdivision for registration in the Land Registry has to be surveyed by Authorised Land Surveyors. The Survey and Mapping Office, being the Survey Authority, checks the quality of and keeps in custody the survey records for reference by other land surveyors.
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