Resettlement_Department_Annual_Report_1964-1965 — Page 23

during the previous year. These removals occurred in the Tai Wo Ping, Ngau Tau Kok, Chai Wan and Ho Man Tin cottage areas.

47. This running down of cottage areas is balanced by fresh res- ponsibilities in the New Territories, where new cottages continued to be built. The extension to the Shui Ngau Ling cottage area, near Yuen Long, completed at the end of the previous year, was largely filled up during the year under review by squatter families and typhoon victims recommended by the District Officer, Yuen Long. The department also had discussions with the New Territories Administration on the pro- posed establishment of a new cottage area at Fo Tan, outside Sha Tin, with money contributed from the Community Relief Trust Fund.

48. After the gazetting in 1963 of Rennie's Mill Village as a cottage resettlement area, development works which had begun in the previous financial year continued. During the year under review, 5,000 feet of cemented paths and 1,900 feet of steps were constructed by the Works Division of the Resettlement Department in various sections of the area. Improvements were also made to drainage and water supply, 22 cottages were built by the Christian Family Service Centre to provide housing for needy families in the village. Five other cottages constructed with funds provided by the Belgian Catholic Mission were completed and allocated to families previously living in unsatisfactory conditions.

CHAPTER VI

THE MULTI-STOREY ESTATES

49. Of the 777,000 people (including tolerated unauthorized persons) who now live in accommodation administered by the Resettlement Department the great majority live in the multi-storey estates. These are mainly in urban Kowloon, but have also spread to two districts of Hong Kong Island and to the New Territories. The origins of multi- storey resettlement housing go back only 11 years to 1954, when two and three-storey temporary buildings known as Bowring Bungalows were built to house the victims of the disastrous fire which occurred at Shek Kip Mei on Christmas Day 1953. Meanwhile, the Public Works Department planned and built taller buildings, eight being completed at Shek Kip Mei in the summer of 1954. The basic design was a six- storey block, H-shaped in plan, with sixty-four rooms on the long arms of the H on each floor, and two water standpipes, six communal flush

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