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Hong Kong’s gentrification in spotlight of urban renewal lecture exploring how districts evolve

  • The transformation of Wedding Card Street into pedestrianised, picture-perfect Lee Tung Street raised rents and pushed out the locals who gave area its charm
  • ‘In most cases, the needs of residents or shop­keepers are not really listened to,’ says Chinese University researcher Gloria Chung

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Lee Tung Street, in Wan Chai, in 2018.
Lauren James
With its Instagram-friendly red lanterns, twinkling lights and European-style boulevard, Lee Tung Street, in Wan Chai, is a rose-tinted vision of a bygone era that has become a hot spot for tourists. “Wedding Card Street” used to be famous for its printing industry but, following its regeneration between 2009 and 2015, it is now home to high-end international brands and restaurants. The gentrification of the city – and whether that can ever be a good thing – will be the subject of a talk hosted by the Hong Kong Anthropological Society next month aimed at anyone with an interest in how districts evolve.
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The speaker, Gloria Chaung Wing-yee, is a Chinese University researcher specialising in urban renewal and resident’s participation in their communities’ evolution. Her fieldwork focuses on areas such as To Kwa Wan and Sham Shui Po, in Kowloon, both histori­cally deprived areas that are undergoing modern­­isation. She says the main problem is that locals aren’t given a say in how the areas are transformed.

“In most cases, the needs of residents or shop­keepers are not really listened to, considered or responded to by the Urban Renewal Authority – especially when it comes to ethnic minorities,” she says. “Residents tell me they don’t really understand their rights or government policies.”

Gloria Chaung Wing-yee, a Chinese University researcher specialising in urban renewal. Photo: Xiaomei Chen
Gloria Chaung Wing-yee, a Chinese University researcher specialising in urban renewal. Photo: Xiaomei Chen

Chaung points to Lee Tung Street as an example of a thriving collection of local businesses that were pushed out by a development that raised rents and transformed the feel of an area. “Some shops tried to reopen in the new area but it was very expensive. Now the last one has closed and most of the original residents have moved away. You used to be able to go there and know it was the place to get any style of wedding card printed. But not any more.”

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During the talk, Chaung, 24, will recount stories she has gathered from businesses and residents, tackling the questions of how nostalgia plays into ideas of old districts, what people’s modern relation­ships with their communities look like and how the government could be doing more to listen to the needs of Hongkongers as the city’s traditional industries and areas fade away.

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