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Hong Kong Annual Administration Reports, 1841–1941
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A reference to paragraph 8 of the memorandum of the Director of Public Works will show that good progress has been made with this work, six miles being already open to traffic.
Communication between British Kowloon and Kowloon City has been improved by the extension of the Hunghom Road on the east side of the Kowloon peninsula to Kowloon City. This work has been almost completed.
Telephone lines have been laid for a distance of about thirty miles, connecting British Kowloon with Kowloon City, Sha-tin, Taipó, Futi Au, Sheung Shui, Au-t'au, and Ping-sháo. The lines will be further extended to Sha'aukok. The thanks of Government are due to the Royal Engineers for having laid the line between Kowloon City, Taipó, and Futi Au.
The Public Works Department has also been kept busy during the year in erecting permanent Police Stations and providing temporary quarters for the executive staff and the Police.
A permanent Police Station has been completed and occupied at Taipó. The permanent stations at Au-t'au and Ping-shán are almost ready for occupation.
No definite decision has as yet been arrived at regarding the erection of permanent quarters for the executive staff, as it was deemed advisable to gain experience of the healthiness of the neighbourhood where the temporary quarters of the executive staff are situated before committing the Colony to any large expenditure on account of permanent buildings. In view, however, of the opinion of the Principal Civil Medical Officer that much of the malaria from which Government officers have suffered so much is due to the temporary nature of the buildings occupied by them, it seems desirable that permanent buildings should be erected without unnecessary delay.
## SURVEY
In my Report on the New Territory, dated 8th October, 1898, it was pointed out that, to deal satisfactorily with the land question, it would be necessary to have an accurate survey.
The desirability of a survey of the whole Territory was recognised by the Colonial Office, and I was instructed on my way out from home at the end of 1898 to place myself in communication with the Surveyor General of Ceylon, Mr. Grimlinton.
I had the advantage of an interview at Colombo with him and the Honourable F. A. Cooper, Director of Public Works in Ceylon, and both these officers were strongly in favour of a complete survey of the territory being made, being of opinion that such survey would, in the long run, prove most economical for Government, and recommended that an application should be made to the Government of India for the officers necessary to carry out the work. After my arrival in Hongkong in February last, the matter was referred to Mr. Ormsby, the Director of Public Works, who consulted with Colonel Elsdale, Commanding Royal Engineer, and, acting on their advice, the Governor decided that a survey should be undertaken. Application was made to the Government of India, which kindly consented to lend the staff required for the work.
On the 19th of October Mr. Tate, who is in charge of the survey operations, arrived, and was followed, on the 1st November, by Mr. Newland, the second survey officer, who brought with him a small staff of Indian trained surveying coolies and surveyors. The Detail Surveyors arrived at the end of November, and were able to commence their work at once on the scale of 16 inches to a mile.
Before surveying was actually commenced, a Chinese notice was issued and posted throughout the territory, explaining the objects of the survey, which, it was feared, might be misunderstood by the natives.
I attach a report on the survey operations with which Mr. Tate has been good enough to furnish me, and which shows that steady progress is being made in the work of survey.
Mr. Tate is struck by the fact that the Chinese take little or no notice of the operations being carried out in their fields, and that no incivility or hindrance has been offered.
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