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HISTORY

The entry of the Chinese into Hong Kong in such large numbers was unforeseen and naturally little provision was made for it. A narrow strip of comparatively level ground along the foreshore was at first the only available land for building, and Queen's Road approximately follows the line of the original settlement. The expansion could only be up the hill, as for example Stanley Street, Wellington Street and Caine Road, once a very fashionable area. The alternative was reclamation from the sea. By 1880 the city, particularly its Chinese quarters in Tai Ping Shan, Sai Ying Pun and Wan Chai, had become seriously overcrowded and insanitary, a circumstance which led to the development of the Peak as a residential area, particularly after 1888 when the Peak Tramway was built.

As a result of complaints from the military about the sanitary condition of Hong Kong, Osbert Chadwick, a sanitary engineer, was sent out by the home government to inquire into the sanitary condition of Hong Kong, and a Sanitary Board was set up in 1883 to which nominated unofficials were added in 1886 and two elected representatives of the ratepayers in 1887. It could bring about little improvement because of Chinese opposition to western ideas-of sanitation and to any interference with their way of life. There was also opposition to the cost of sanitary improvements on the part of the community, already burdened by a costly programme of public works and by defence expenditure, at a time when the dollar was falling in value. The result of this neglect was an outbreak of the plague in 1894. Two Japanese, Professor Vitasato and Dr Aoyama-who came to assist, claimed to be the first to isolate the plague bacillus and to demonstrate that it was carried by rats. Even then there was considerable opposition to house-cleansing and measures against rat-infestation. Annual visitations of the plague continued until about 1927. The Sanitary Board continued until 1935 when its functions were broadened and taken over by an Urban Council.

Overcrowding was also relieved by reclamation from the sea. The earliest was the filling of a small creek in 1851 to make what is now Bonham Strand. Bowrington (1859) and Kennedy Town (1877) were built partly on reclaimed land, but the most important was the reclamation in the central district begun in 1890 and completed in 1904 which added Chater Road, Connaught Road