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LAND AND HOUSING

The provision of a precise network of control points for aerial surveys was one of the main tasks during the year and this work is expected to continue. Another major control project was the remeasuring of the special roof-top traverse for the mass transit railway, as many of the marked points originally had disappeared.

There was a marked fall off in demand for boundary surveys, enabling more staff to be deployed in coping with arrears in other sectors. Following the decision by the government that Hong Kong would convert to the metric system, all surveys have been made in metric units from October 1974, although cadastral plans will continue to show dimensions in imperial units until January 1976, after which the Building Ordinance Office will accept plans and drawings in both metric and imperial units.

In January 1974 two contractors were awarded a new aerial survey contract, to provide urgently needed 1/500 scale plans for engineering designs for use in connection with the new towns of the New Territories. Funds were also approved to set up a Public Works Department photogrammetric unit and arrangements were made to call for tenders so that the necessary equipment could be installed in 1975.

Progress was made with revision of large scale maps and a start was made on converting the existing imperial unit maps to metric scales, some 100 sheets being re-drawn at 1/1,000 scale during the year.

A good start was also made on changing to a metric format for small scale maps --1/10,000 scale and smaller, which are also to be completely dual-language in future. Metrication presented the opportunity to re-design the mapping sheet grid system so that all maps from 1/1,000 scale to 1/20,000 scale are the same size and all sheets covering the same area are tied to the same reference. It is possible by identifying a point on one map series to find the same point, with a minimum of trouble, on larger or smaller scale maps or plans. In addition, three sheets of the four-sheet 'Countryside' series and seven sheets of a 15-sheet street map series were published.

Town Planning

The two bodies mainly responsible for town planning in Hong Kong are the Town Planning Board, chaired by the Director of Public Works and comprising nine official and five unofficial members; and the Land Development Policy Committee (Land Development Planning Committee prior to August), chaired by the Secretary for the Environment and comprising six official members. The functions of the Town Planning Office include the servicing of these two bodies, and, together with the New Territories Development Department, servicing the New Territories Development Progress Committee. There are three main levels of planning which proceed from general concepts to development projects. They are the Hong Kong Outline Plan (formerly the Colony Outline Plan), statutory outline zoning plans, and departmental plans in the form of planning guides, outline development plans, planning layouts and 10-year development programmes.

The original Colony Outline Plan, which was based on a data bank of land use and demographic information and the findings of six inter-departmental working committees, was prepared under the guidance of the Land Development Planning

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