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Hong Kong budget 2024-25
OpinionComment
Tom Yam
Tom Yam

Opinion | Artificial islands project: a white elephant that’s cheaper to abort now

  • In fiscally challenging times, the government has delayed the Kau Yi Chau reclamation project and is considering private financing for it
  • Instead, the time should be used to rigorously re-examine whether the project ought to move forward at all

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The Kau Yi Chau project would create 1,000 hectares of land for 500,000 residents in the middle of the sea. Photo: Jelly Tse
Tom Yam
Given Hong Kong’s fiscal deficits and dwindling reserves, clearly the government cannot simultaneously implement two colossal infrastructure projects, the Kau Yi Chau Artificial Islands and the Northern Metropolis. Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po recently said that the former, a controversial reclamation project off Lantau Island, would be delayed by two to three years, though he vowed it wouldn’t be abandoned.
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While the government has rightly postponed the Kau Yi Chau project, it should use the delay to rigorously re-examine whether the project should move forward. A white elephant that is stillborn would cost far less than one that dies fully grown.

As the project stands, seldom has so colossal, costly and complex a scheme come with such shoddy analysis, unproven assumptions and slogan-driven publicity akin to real estate marketing. Since the government announced the initial version of the project in 2014, it has focused on a handful of numbers – the area to be reclaimed, the number of residents – plus a proposed central business district.

On that slim basis, officials and supporters of the reclamation have made sweeping claims about its necessity and benefits. The government has also skipped the critical feasibility study, and jumped into spending HK$550 million (US$71 million) on a planning and engineering study.
Already, the proposal is on its third iteration. When he was chief executive, Leung Chun-ying proposed the project in 2014 as the East Lantau Metropolis, which would be around 1,000 hectares. The next chief executive, Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor, changed the name to Lantau Tomorrow Vision in 2018, increasing the area to be reclaimed from 1,000 hectares to 1,700 hectares with no explanation. The current administration under John Lee Ka-chiu changed the name of the project to Kau Yi Chau Artificial Islands and reverted to reclaiming 1,000 hectares, again with no explanation.
People visit the Civil Engineering and Development Department’s exhibition on proposals for the Kau Yi Chau Artificial Islands project on February 9, 2023. Photo: K. Y. Cheng
People visit the Civil Engineering and Development Department’s exhibition on proposals for the Kau Yi Chau Artificial Islands project on February 9, 2023. Photo: K. Y. Cheng

The marketing strategy also keeps changing: East Lantau Metropolis was apparently intended to drive the development of Lantau, while Lantau Tomorrow Vision was to help integrate Hong Kong further into the Greater Bay Area. The Kau Yi Chau project is now marketed as an extension of western Hong Kong Island that would form a harbour metropolis. This is as good as selling the same drink in three different bottles, as beer, wine and champagne.

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