Hong Kong's government has unveiled a £60 billion infrastructure project to address its land shortage by building one of the world's largest artificial islands.
Called Lantau Tomorrow Vision, the 1,000 hectares of reclaimed land near the island of Lantau would be enough space for 260,000 homes, said government officials.
If it goes ahead it would surpass Hong Kong International Airport, designed by Foster + Partners, as the fourth largest artificial island in the world, and would be the city's largest infrastructure project to date.
Most of new homes would be public housing
The plan is an attempt to address the city's "serious shortage of land supply", Hong Kong's secretary for development Michael Wong was reported as saying in CNN. The government plans for 70 per cent of the homes on the island to be public housing. However, the plans has not been received positively by all of Hong Kong's residents, with several groups protesting over the financial and environmental impact of the giant infrastructure project.
The land would be reclaimed near the island of Lantau. Photo is by Typhoonchaser
Protests against the cost of the development have been spearheaded by the Save Lantau Alliance, which has written an open letter to Hong Kong's chief executive Carrie Lam, calling the project a "white elephant" and demanding it be withdrawn "immediately".
This new island would be almost twice the size of Dubai's 560 hectare Palm Jumeirah, and at HK$624...