Lamma Island
- Yung Shue Wan
 Dear
Friends of Lamma,
On Friday, October 24th, 2003 members of the Save Lamma Campaign
met with the Planning Department and Civil Engineering Department
to further discuss the revised proposal for the Yung Shue
Wan harbour and the way forward.
THE GOOD NEWS is that the departments continue
to support a much reduced project focused on enhancing rather
than radically changing Yung Shue Wan. An indicative map of
the current concept is attached to this email.
THE BAD NEWS, depending on how you look
at it, is that this will be a long process. With the scrapping
of the original reclamation, the entire project has to back
through the government planning process from the beginning.
This could be a long wait - up to five years -- with several
hurdles to pass, including the need to access funding. However,
the advantage of this process
is that the technical feasibility study, the detailed design,
etc. will all be up for review, and that means more opportunity
to come up with a plan that truly serves the long term interests
of the community. For example, the government continues to
insist that wave reflectors will be needed to protect the
village from the raging sea.  The
Save Lamma Campaign believes that these unnecessary structures
are damaging to the local character and inappropriate for
a sensitive tourist area. But the reopened planning process
means that if the technical feasibility study indicates that
extensive reflectors are needed, then we will still have an
opportunity to push for alternatives such as a breakwater
at the entrance to the harbour.
Thanks for your support,
The Save Lamma Campaign
Copyright © 2003. South China Morning
Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
Monday June 16 2003
Lamma residents fight ring road plan
Heike Phillips
After a three-year battle to stop a harbour reclamation project,
Yung Shue Wan villagers are back on the warpath
Lamma residents have sent in a flurry of last-minute objections
to a proposed ring road for emergency vehicle access they
claim is 'damaging and unnecessary'.
Fresh from doing battle over a proposed reclamation project
at Yung Shue Wan harbour, local campaigners said they had
only just found out about the plan to build a $12 million
ring road.
Submissions close today.
Bobsy Jureidini, a founding member of the Save Lamma Campaign
and chairman of the ABLE charity group which lobbies for a
better living environment on Lamma, said residents had been
unaware of the proposal until an announcement last month.
'It just came out of the blue. When we saw the plans we just
said 'oh no - not again',' he said. The project has been 10
years in development.
The Save Lamma Campaign group has been engaged in a three-year
battle to stop the proposed reclamation of the island's picturesque
Yung Shue Wan harbour.
Faced with widespread opposition from residents, tourists
and local business people, the government decided to suspend
the original plan in January. Discussions continue over an
alternate proposal.
'We are not opposed to development - we are just opposed
to bad development,' Mr Jureidini said.
A spokeswoman for the Environment, Transport and Works Bureau
said almost 70 submissions had been received by Friday, up
from just 11 a week earlier.
The 2.5 to 3.5 metre-wide road would take a year to complete.
It will form a circle from Main Street through the Yung Shue
Long Valley wetlands and forest and past Sha Po Village.
'We're not saying there is no need for some form of improvements,'
Mr Jureidini said.
'Certainly quite a few areas need widening. But this plan
is badly designed. It does not tie in with future development
plans.'
He said it was ironic that the government had designated
Lamma as a tourist attraction yet intended to build a road
through some of the island's most beautiful areas.
Hung Sing-yip, senior engineer with rural road development
at the Highways Department, said the aim was to improve access
for emergency vehicles.
'We want to build proper access roads so we can use better
emergency vehicles so we can save people's lives,' he said.
Cecilia Chu Wai-sim, of the Save Lamma Campaign, said a recent
meeting with government officials revealed the proposal was
more than 10 years old and was therefore based on outdated
priorities and population projections.
But Gavin Tse Chun-tat, senior engineer with the Home Affairs
Department works section, said issues such as population growth
had been taken into account and the department saw no need
to change the original project.
Lamma resident Adam Luck said he failed to see the justification
for the project, other than to benefit developers and as a
'glorified job creation scheme'.
'I have two small children and I am very disturbed about
the safety implications of the road,' Mr Luck said.
'Some of the village drivers are already quite irresponsible
and speed on the narrow pathways. A wider pathway will just
encourage them to go faster.'
Ms Chu said the ring road seemed to have been planned without
any reference to other projects in Yung Shue Wan, such as
plans for a narrow promenade along the waterfront for pedestrians
and emergency vehicles.
'The government needs to look at how this project interacts
with other projects,' she said.
Engineers for the Home Affairs Department and Highways Department
both said the harbour reclamation proposal was a 'separate
project'.
But in a separate response from the Home Affairs Department,
a spokesman said the ring road project would form part of
the pedestrian and emergency vehicle access system shown on
the latest approved Yung Shue Wan Layout Plan.
The future development in Yung Shue Wan had been taken into
account in the layout plan, the spokesman said.
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