ENG-1957 — Page 235

LAND AND HOUSING

B. Premises of various types on 31.12.57

(Numbers on 31.12.56 are shown in brackets)

Cottage Areas

Multi-Storey Estates

Domestic cottages and huts. 14,304 (14,001)

Nil (Nil)

Self-contained flats

Nil (Nil)

70 (Nil)

Domestic rooms

Nil (Nil)

26,138 (23,066)

Shops of various kinds

379

(388)

643 (379)

Restaurants and cafes

16

(10)

108 (51)

Workshops

49

(47)

253

(147)

Factories

25

(22)

54

(Nil)

Schools, Clinics and Welfare

Centres

37

(29)

53

(21)

199

URBAN BUILDINGS

The new Building Regulations made under the Buildings Ordinance, 1955, have now been in force for 18 months and it is possible to assess to a certain extent their effect upon the building industry in the Colony. The most noteworthy change has been in the form of redevelopment of large areas of land. These areas are now being redeveloped in a manner completely different from that adopted prior to the coming into force of the 1955 Ordinance, the tendency being to erect very large blocks of small self-contained flats on the lines of those built by the Housing Authority and the Hong Kong Housing Society. There is much to commend this form of development, since it is thus possible to arrange for the open space resulting from the construction of such buildings to be available for communal use by the residents. In the formerly well-established Chinese-tenement-type planning there was a series of small yards at ground floor level (in- variably used only by the ground floor tenant and normally in connexion with a shop or other non-domestic use) and scavenging lanes.

The erection of buildings containing 20 or more storeys is rapidly becoming more common, and it seems clear that skyscrapers, at any rate in the business centres, will be the future form of development.