ENG-2013 — Page 239

12

Infrastructure Development and Heritage Conservation

Environmental and Area Improvement

A Planning Department consultancy study completed in March produced a comprehensive set of standardised and reasonably representative site wind availability data as inputs to both qualitative and quantitative Air Ventilation Assessments for planning and development projects in Hong Kong.

The Planning Department also commenced the Planning and Design Study for the Redevelopment of Queensway Plaza in Admiralty in November. The study aims to investigate the feasibility of redeveloping Queensway Plaza for commercial use (including Grade A office and retail use) and to propose improvement to the existing public areas and pedestrian environment nearby.

Hong Kong Planning Standards and Guidelines

The Hong Kong Planning Standards and Guidelines provide the criteria for determining the scale, location and site requirements of various land uses and facilities applicable to planning studies, town plans and development control. They are reviewed from time to time to take account of changes in government policies, demographic characteristics, and social and economic trends. During the year, the planning standards and guidelines for utility services and internal transport facilities were revised.

Land Sale Arrangement

The government's policy objective is to maintain the healthy and steady development of the property market. The government abolished the Application Mechanism in 2013-14 and fully resumed the lead in selling government sites. The government includes in the Land Sale Programme sites that it anticipates can be made available for sale in the year, and announces in advance on a quarterly basis the land sale programmes, providing transparency and certainty for the market. Since the announcement of the 2013-14 Land Sale Programme in February, the government has been selling land in a proactive manner. Between April and December 2013, the government put up for sale 24 residential sites, which were capable of providing about 8,250 flats. To ensure the quantity of flat supply, the government specified the minimum number of flats to be built at 14 sites on which at least 6,990 flats would be built.

Land Supply

To meet Hong Kong's growing housing and other development needs, the government adopts a multi-pronged strategy to increase land supply in the short, medium and long term, through the continued and systematic implementation of a series of measures, including the optimal use of developed land as far as practicable and the creation of new land for development.

Ten initiatives put forward in the 2013 Policy Address will increase the supply of housing land in the short to medium term. They include reviewing various land use zonings to identify suitable sites for conversion to residential use, converting land to housing or other uses that meet more pressing community needs where the land's original intended use is no longer required, and increasing the development density of residential sites as far as allowable in planning terms.

191