Resettlement_Department_Annual_Report_1963-1964 — Page 6

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION AND REVIEW OF THE YEAR

INTRODUCTION

PERHAPS the best way of appreciating the task of the Resettlement Depart- ment is to fly over Hong Kong in a helicopter. The great urban masses of the Island and Kowloon are fringed by hills, many of whose slopes are covered by a rash of small huts and shacks. There live the squatters, who have spread in their hundreds of thousands over the hills, over many rooftops in town itself, and into any interstices they could find among the built-up areas. Looking down again on the scene, it will be noticed that extending in a great broken arc to the north of Kowloon, from Li Cheng Uk in the west to Yau Tong in the east, is a series of large estates, each made up of ‘H', 'I' or 'L' shaped blocks of flats, gaily colour- washed. The same type of estate will be seen at Chai Wan on the Island, and in Tsuen Wan, the nascent satellite city in the New Territories. Extending and amplifying the arc in Kowloon, thickening out in Chai Wan and Tsuen Wan, and breaking fresh ground in the Aberdeen area, will be seen more great blocks still in the process of creation. All these are the resettlement estates in which the squatters are rehoused. Next in our panorama, groups of small cottages may be picked out here and there: these are the cottage resettlement areas where former squatters live under the supervision of the Resettlement Department. Finally, the observer will notice that some squatter areas are neater than others, with the huts in straight rows and with adequate fire lanes at regular intervals. These are temporary resite areas where in certain circumstances people are permitted to build their own huts and where basic facilities are provided for them. This flight has already suggested in outline the Resettlement Department's functions: negatively, to prevent further squatter encroachments; positively, to clear squatters from land needed for development into resettlement estates, together with their businesses into estate shops and their small-scale industries into workshops or separate factory estates; to administer and maintain these estates and cottage areas; and to supervise the temporary resite areas and allocate building space in them.

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