Lamma Paths

Yung Shue Long "ring road"

There is also a list of dozens of properties to be partly resumed to make way for it.

Widening the main path to the beach in some places is well overdue, but this looks suspiciously over-engineered for the standard reason of "emergency vehicle access". After a few years here you learn that there is always a hidden agenda in any, especially large, construction project. Possibly it is related to the new channels to be built in September in Yung Shue Long, as this would give better access for construction vehicles for the building boom that is undoubtedly planned there when the valley is drained. Goodbye to that spot of greenery next to Main Street.

Closer examination of the route makes one wonder why, if it is for "emergency access", by what, and to what? There are very few houses on this route, aside from those at Kam Shan Terrace which are already accessible from the beach road. Also, there is no link to the fire/ambulance station, though it passes a few metres below it. It might make sense to upgrade the stairway/footpath from the fire station down to link with the road below to give fast access to Main Street, but this is not contemplated. The new section, about 20 metres below the fire station, is abandoned agricultural land. There are no houses there. And if there should be a fire or other emergency, the firemen could unreel their hoses from the station itself. (Though after the excavations and shotcreting beside the new road, emergency access to this area will actually be more difficult.)

This looks very much like a real estate project funded by the government, which will not only profit local developers, but reward them with "compensation" after spending a fortune improving access.

There was a site meeting on Lamma on 6th June 2003 at which several concerned residents met with government officials and engineers. There is a report in The Standard by Paris Lord.

One very interesting fact came up: the original plan called for the (obvious) connection of the Fire Station with the existing road below (making the new road cutting below the station to the basketball court even more redundant). However, this was somehow vetoed after "objections by residents" as it might disturb grave sites.

How these residents were informed of the plan years before any others knew of it is not clear. Also, walking the path one sees these graves could easily be avoided, and in any case are funeral urns, not actual graves.

It is very clear this plan's function is to enable real estate development, not enhance safety, as speeding up traffic will definitely make this a more dangerous place.

Read more about this at Savelamma.org, Lamma.com.hk, the Citizens Party and the SCMP.

Any objections to the plan ("based on personal interests and impacts") must be made before June 16th 2003, to :

Dr. Sarah Liao
Secretary for Environment, Transport and Works
Environment, Transport and Works Branch
16/F. Murray Building, Garden Road, Hong Kong
Tel: 2810-2788; Fax: 2136-8017

They do not accept formal objections by email, but there is an enquiry address: etwbenq@etwb.gov.hk

Tai Peng

The DO rather disingenuously describes it as a "mud path", and says "it would save the time [four minutes] of the [fire] crew members spent in walking" to reach the area. However, the path is flat and easily trafficable, certainly by the new all-terrain fire vehicles, so firemen would not need to walk now. One suspects that the motivation is from a local developer who wants the government to improve access for his construction vehicles and increase the value of new houses.

See some photos of the Tai Peng footpath which show what would be lost, and also that there is, as is usually the case with these proposals, NO NEED to concrete this to allow vehicular access, as the parallel tyre tracks visible show that emergency vehicles could easily use it as is.

Dr John Wedderburn in Tai Peng is leading the campaign against this.

You can register a complaint by email to the District Office. If you do, please copy your message to me at my email address.

Update: this project is going ahead, though it is claimed it will be done in a "sensitive" style.

Lo So Shing - Hung Shing Yeh

According to the District Office, the Lamma Area Committee "is of the view that widening the path between Lo So Shing and Hung Shing Yeh is necessary as the existing footpath is too narrow to cater for the use of the increasing numbers of tourists. They also point out that the other sections of the footpath from Yung Shue Wan to Sok Kwu Wan are already of a width of 1.8m. The objective of widening the footpath from Lo So Shing to Hung Shing Yeh to 1.8 m is thus only to bring it in line with the remaining sections of the footpath."

This project will entail breaking up the existing concrete, and laying new concrete almost twice as deep and wide, replacing the existing road which was completed only a few years ago and is still in almost pristine condition. Environmentally, there will be the perennial problem of broken concrete and other waste dumped on the hillsides by contractors, no matter what the District Office says about clean up, and very likely extensive shotcreting of the hillsides next to the path.

There is no evidence of any need for this path, other than the fatuous statement of it being "too narrow" for tourists. The tour-groups that wander along the path on Sundays will clump up no matter how wide the path is; they will simply walk four abreast instead of two. There is little congestion now and the construction will create much worse disruption for a long period than any it is supposed to solve. There has as yet been no response to my requests for a budget or schedule for this project.

Some photos showing the current state of the path are here Judge for yourself.

District Office, Islands, Harbour Bldg, 20F, 38 Pier Rd Central
email District Office Islands, fax 2850-5104

Some objections already lodged are here.
I will add copies of objections to this site, please copy to me at this address.

The Lo Tik - Luk Chau Path

Here's a more detailed map of the area, with the proposed "improvement" (ie concreting and guardrails) marked in red.

In February 2002 notices were briefly posted proposing "Improvement to footpath from Luk Chau to Lo Tik Wan". One notice was in Yung Shue Wan, at the official locked notice board by the police post. Though they are required to be displayed for one month, it was removed within three days, to reappear a few days before the end of the month. No notices were posted on the actual path. Other notices were apparently displayed at the villages of Luk Chau and Lo Tik.

Fortunately a few Lamma residents noticed this and tried to find out what the "improvements" entailed. The District Office's explanation was that the villagers had requested a "road link" between the villages. The supposed beneficiaries were the handful of residents of the two above villages, who had suddenly, after some centuries without a footpath between them, discovered the need to walk for an hour to visit their neighbours in preference to using a boat to cover the 300 metres of coast separating them. One might wonder why, if a footpath was required, that a much shorter direct route (in purple on the detailed map) wasn't investigated. (This incidentally would complement the existing hill path by allowing a loop through the villages.) A detailed response by Alan Sargent can be seen here.

CONCRETING "SHELVED"!

Some photos of the path are here

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