Hong Kong's Suburbs - Tin Shui Wai

[hkskyline]

Tin Shui Wai New Town is located in the northwestern part of New Territories. Its development began in 1987. A total area of about 430 hectares of land has been formed by reclamation of the low lying areas. The Development Zone of 220 hectares, located in the southern part of the new town, has been developed to house about 200 000 people, complete with all infrastructure works and a full range of community facilities. An LRT line and new roads linking the new town to the trunk road network provide good communication with the Yuen Long and Tuen Mun districts and to the urban areas beyond.

Further expansion of the new town into the remaining areas to the north, known as the Reserve Zone with an area of 210 hectares commenced in July 1998. The infrastructure are completed in stages from 2000 to 2004 to cope with population intake of the housing developments. To the northeastern portion of the new town, a constructed wetland has been completed which serves as a buffer between the developments in the Reserve Zone and the Mai Po Nature Reserve. The constructed wetland will be further developed into a wetland park for completion in end 2005. The population of Tin Shui Wai new town will increase from the present level of 270 000 to 305 000 in 2011. Extension of the LRT service to the Reserve Zone and West Rail were commissioned in late 2003 to tie in with the West Rail programme.

Before

1992

2002

[ezcheese]

This is interesting. China is really booming.

[Hisma]

they look like rows of 50 story military barracks.

This is a good example of "urban sprawl". Cookie cutter highrises, creating almost the exact same effect of suburban sprawl. Yuck.

[peaceloveunderstanding]

madness... I have never seen anything like it.

[cheeriokid61]

You know, it'd be really cool if they could spell out some word with all those skyscrapers.

[peaceloveunderstanding]

that would hillarious

[Viper]

For a moment, I thought this was the Simcity 4 board.

[Urban_Legend]

That looks so sci-fi.

[K6-III]

Reminds me of Moscow...I love it!

[TheFutureIsNow]

Why do they have to keep building those, can't they try something new like one of those mega-city pyramid proposals for tokyo instead those horribly ugly boxes. IMO it looks like it would be extremely miserable to live in one of those.

[peaceloveunderstanding]

^ it's called communism.

[TheBostonian]

^ it's called communism.

Hong Kong is still rated the most economically free "country" in the world. As for these developments, I would really like to walk among these buildings and see what is at ground level. Our common desire as urban enthusiasts is for high-density mixed-use projects. What happens with very high residential-only density? Does this neighborhood have basic amenities but you have to hop on a train for all else? I have many questions about this.

http://www.heritage.org/research/features/...x/countries.cfm

UPDATE: The wikipedia article, unsourced, reports of a lack of amenities such as a hospital and permanent library. But it does reportedly have a lot of suicides and shopping malls. Anyone who can back this up wins a prize. It also says the project is indeed a public housing project and includes many public-benefits-receiving residents.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tin_Shui_Wai

[colin]

Most of China looks like this: cookie-cutter skyscrapers with the occassional field of grass and mass transit hub.

All of Singapore is like this as well though except for the older sections. I think it's just a Chinese thing.

I wouldn't lump Hong Kong as "communist" though. Hong Kong is still a special zone in the eyes of the Chinese government. They were smart, and didn't just try to push Hong Kong over to their side immediately. I was in Hong Kong right before the hand-over and right after, and the only thing that I saw had changed was the uniforms of the police.

And really, it seems that Chinese cities are becoming more like Hong Kong instead of the other way around.

A lot of this "urban sprawl" technique existed in Hong Kong long before the Chinese even began to think about taking it over. A lot of the areas built up in the 70's and 80's on Kowloon look like this, just older.

[ZachariahDaMan]

Interesting photos, I'm glad our cities don't have buildings that all look the same.

[hkskyline]

Interesting photos, I'm glad our cities don't have buildings that all look the same.

... except in suburbia

[GRDadof3]

I feel oppressed just looking at some of those photos Nice shots though hksyline.