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Natalie Wong

Hong Kong should revive plans for large-scale reclamation off Lantau Island to run in parallel with the Northern Metropolis project, property magnate Gordon Wu Ying-sheung has said, warning that a lack of urban land will hold back the city’s development as the population grows.
The 90-year-old founder and chairman of Hopewell Holdings also described it as “too early to say” whether his property empire would follow its peers and commit to investing in the mega development near the city’s border with mainland China.
“We don’t know, because at the present moment the land is still not owned by the government. So that’s the first priority [for us],” he told the South China Morning Post. “Get the ownership, get the transport – all that is the government’s [job]. After that, the private sector will come in.”
Wu said Hong Kong’s development had been constrained by a lack of land, which had led to the housing affordability crisis. He noted that out of Hong Kong’s roughly 1,000 sq km of land, housing a population of 7.5 million, only about 25 per cent had been developed for residential and urban use.
While Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu’s administration has focused heavily on the 30,000-hectare Northern Metropolis project as the key driver of Hong Kong’s growth, Wu argued that large-scale reclamation in waters off Lantau – which he advocated for decades – should be revived.
“The priority is the Northern Metropolis, but you still have to be prepared … Hong Kong’s [population] may grow to about 10 million people. How can you handle it? You’ve got to think ahead, find the land on top of the Northern Metropolis,” Wu said.
“The cheapest way to produce land inexpensively is to reclaim the shallow waters, open up the hills, use the soil and put it in there and you kill two birds with one stone.”
Wu, a civil engineer by profession, has been well-known for planning, designing, and constructing major projects in Hong Kong, mainland China, Southeast Asia and overseas since the 1970s.


Wu has advocated for a 4,820-hectare reclamation and land-flattening project around Lantau. He said that by levelling mountainous terrain in western Lantau and Chi Ma Wan and using the excavated soil for reclamation, commuters could travel from the newly developed zones to Hong Kong Island in 10 minutes if a railway network were built to connect them.
His blueprint was partially adopted by then chief executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor under the Lantau Tomorrow Vision scheme in 2018, though it was scaled down to a 1,700-hectare proposal involving three artificial islands.
Last year, Lee’s government shelved the HK$580 billion (US$74.6 billion) reclamation project, with Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po saying that priority should be given to the Northern Metropolis development, which will require more than HK$360 billion in funding over the next five to six years.
Dismissing critics who said Hong Kong could not afford both massive schemes at the same time, Wu urged the government to urgently resume serious research into the project’s “true cost” and long-term benefits.
“You don’t want to expand to Shenzhen [only], because the transport time will be too much. Hong Kong is a compact place, and we have to stay compact, but also be comfortable and liveable.”
He also brushed aside environmental concerns regarding marine ecosystem disruption, pointing to Hong Kong’s long history of successfully building thriving new towns and expanding districts on reclaimed land.




Beyond land supply, Wu weighed in on the government’s recent high-profile mission into Central Asia, urging the public to be patient before expecting immediate benefits.
“If you don’t try, you’ll never get to the right basket,” Wu said. “You can always try something, and if it doesn’t work out, fine. But it may turn out to be a very pleasant surprise.”
True to his reputation as Hong Kong’s “King of Highways”, Wu said the fundamental formula for economic development had never changed.
“For every economy, the starting point is always transport,” he said, referring to direct flight routes set to be relaunched next year between Almaty in Kazakhstan and Hong Kong as part of an agreement brokered during Lee’s trip.
“It’s the airlines that are taking the financial risk,” Wu said. “But if you don’t have direct flights, you are severely limiting your access to that part of the world.”


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Lack of urban land will hold back city’s development as population grows, Hopewell Holdings chairman argues


Lack of urban land will hold back city’s development as population grows, Hopewell Holdings chairman argues.


Lantau reclamation plans should be revived, property tycoon Gordon Wu says

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Lack of urban land will hold back city’s development as population grows, Hopewell Holdings chairman argues

Lack of urban land will hold back city’s development as population grows, Hopewell Holdings chairman argues