Xiangjiang, known as the Pearl of the Orient, is one of the most prosperous international metropolises in Asia.
Its airport is one of the busiest airports in the world, with hundreds of takeoffs and landings every day, and close to or even more than 100,000 passengers.
Note this is every day!
The number of trips of 100,000 people is a terrible number. What’s more important is that passengers who can travel by air are basically either rich or expensive. Even those who take ordinary class passengers on low-cost flights are people who have no worries about food and drink.
The spending power of such people is amazing. If the Kowloon Walled City is transformed into a service-providing place such as a hotel or a duty-free shopping mall, the advantage of being close to the airport can be used to earn money from passengers and even captains and stewardesses.
The wealth is no joke, it is comparable to gold bricks falling from the sky, and its development value is even higher than the city center of Central.
But after the walled city is bulldozed, what will happen to the villagers inside? There are 50,000 people inside. If the resettlement is not done properly, there will be big problems.
It will definitely not work if the original building is demolished!
Because if you want to use the Kowloon Walled City, you must build shopping malls, high-end residential buildings and other buildings. The price is not affordable for the aborigines of the Kowloon Walled City, even if relocation compensation is paid.
Because the minimum size of a high-end residence is two bedrooms and one living room, six to seven hundred square feet, and the price difference is so high that even the residents of the village cannot afford it even if they sell it.
The villagers can only be resettled in other places.
Lei Weidong didn't know what the British Hong Kong government did in real time and space. He probably applied for public rental housing for them so that they could have a place to stay.
More!
Xiangjiang is capitalist. The capitalists are eager to squeeze out the marrow of the common people. How can they let the common people take advantage?
As for filing a lawsuit if you refuse to accept it.
The tycoons in capitalist society are most afraid of litigating with the poor. They will hire a team of lawyers to beat the poor to death with money.
Let the poor not only waste energy but also lose money.
"I have already thought of the resettlement method. It will definitely not work if the original building is demolished. In that case, there will be no profit." Lei Weidong glanced at the crowd and said:
“I have ordered a batch of containers from the mainland and placed them in the Yuen Long area, and are arranging water and electricity connections for the temporary resettlement of residents of Kowloon Walled Village.
As for where they will be placed in the future, I plan to launch the Northern Metropolitan Area Strategy and place them in the northern New Territories. "
"Northern Metropolitan Area, Mr. Lei, are you planning to develop the northern part of the New Territories?" Mr. Dong asked.
"Yes!"
Lei Weidong nodded and said: "For a long time, the development of Xiangjiang has been strong in the south and weak in the north. Most of the industry and population are concentrated in the south, while large areas in the north are undeveloped.
It used to be okay. Although the north had fewer people, it was an industrial area with a large number of factories. It not only provided jobs but also paid a large amount of taxes.
However, since the 1980s, with the development of the mainland, a large number of manufacturing industries in Xiangjiang have moved to the mainland, and the proportion of the northern regional economy in Xiangjiang has continued to decline from the original 30%.
It has now fallen below 5% and is sliding towards 2%.
Although Hong Kong's financial, real estate, insurance, tourism and other industries are strong, allowing Hong Kong's economy to rapidly improve, the hollowing out of Hong Kong's economy, which has lost the real economy, is serious.
It is highly dependent on the outside world. If there is any disturbance, the economy of Hong Kong will be hit hard. Changes must be made, and developing the northern part of Hong Kong is the best strategy. Of course, when developing, we must pay attention to the fact that finance cannot be the core and science and technology should be the leading factor. .
In the future, there will be two urban centers in Xiangjiang. The southern one is dominated by finance, and the northern one is dominated by science and technology. The combination of the two is the way to go.
"The south is dominated by finance and the north is dominated by technology. Mr. Lei, how big is your plan for the northern metropolitan area and what areas does it include?"
Mr. Dong, who has already decided to take office, is very interested in the northern metropolitan area proposed by Lei Weidong. He feels that he has found the future path of Xiangjiang.
“The northern metropolitan area I plan is mainly based on the two local administrative districts of Yuen Long District and North District.
Mainly the mature new towns such as Tin Shui Wai, Yuen Long, Fanling and Sheung Shui and their adjacent rural areas, including Kwu Tung North, Fanling North, Hung Shui Kiu, Ha Tsuen, Yuen Long South, San Tin and Lok Ma Chau, Man Kam To and North New Town in the New Territories. "
Lei Weidong took out a map that marked the areas included in the northern metropolitan area.
"Leisheng, the northern metropolitan area you drew is too big, almost three hundred square kilometers. It is not easy to develop such a large area. And the biggest trouble is the land. A lot of land has been deserted for a long time. In fact, they all have owners.
Rather than struggling to acquire these lands, it is better to reclaim land from the sea. "
Looking at the location marked by Lei Weidong on the map, Huo Daheng lamented that Lei Weidong was domineering. If such a large area could be built, Xiangjiang's economy would definitely skyrocket, but the difficulties would be huge.
Xiangjiang is no different than the mainland. As a capitalist area, the land in Xiangjiang is privately owned. Regardless of whether these areas are mountains, forests or fields, they are all owned by their owners.
What's more important is that these owners are not paupers, either wealthy families in Xiangjiang or local snakes nearby.
The movie "Descendants of the Dragon" has a description.
Zhou Xiaolong, played by Xingye, looks like a country bumpkin, but he is actually a rich second generation. His father, Zhou Feihong, played by Yuen Wah, appears to be the instructor of Tai O Village in Lantau Island, but in fact he is the largest landowner in the area, owning half of the land in Tai O. .
The other half is in the hands of Maomao's family, Zhou Xiaolong's childhood sweetheart.
What's more important is that Zhou Xiaolong and Maomao like each other. Once they get married, the entire Da'ao land is under their names.
These local rich people have money, land, food and clothing, and prestige in the local area. It is very difficult to get land from them, and it is not something that can be done with money.
As a result, the development area of Xiangjiang is very small, and most of the area is green mountains and green waters.
The environment is good, but compared with mainland cities, Xiangjiang has really lagged behind in the 21st century, so much so that there are stupid thieves who want to rob in the bustling urban area of Xiangjiang.
Because he didn't know the road, he rode his bicycle towards a place with many buildings. As a result, he walked from the New Territories to the Special Administrative Region and was arrested by the border police.
This is not Lei Weidong's fabrication but a true story. It was reported by the Xiangjiang website. It seems that a man from Jiangsu Province in the Mainland smuggled into Xiangjiang. After smuggling into Xiangjiang, he fell into financial difficulties because he had no connections. In order to survive, he made his own money. He had a copycat bomb and was going to Hong Kong Central to rob.
Because he was unfamiliar with the place and didn't know the way from the New Territories to Central, so after setting off, he headed towards a place with many buildings, thinking that as long as he got to a place with many buildings, he could reach the golden Central.
What he didn't expect was that after decades of development, high-rise buildings had risen from the ground, and the area was colorful, noisy and prosperous, giving it the look of a metropolis.
Places such as the Hong Kong New Territories have maintained a simple rural style due to land privatization.
This led the man to head towards the multi-story building, but he went in the wrong direction. He was thinking of going to Central, but ended up going to the Special Administrative Region. When he passed the checkpoint, he was suspected by the police because he was acting suspiciously, so he stopped him and checked him. As a result, a suspicious bomb-like object was found in his bag.
Although this report is somewhat ridiculous, it also shows that Xiangjiang is no longer unique, and the Special Economic Zone and other places have caught up.
The green mountains and green waters cannot be moved. If they are moved, let alone the landowners who do not agree, even if they agree, the high land compensation will cause a headache for the Xiangjiang government.
As a last resort, the Hong Kong government could only turn the ship around and ask for land from the sea.
The biggest reason why successive Hong Kong governments like to reclaim land from the sea is that the land in the sea is owned by the public. Not to mention the high cost of reclamation, one acre of land costs hundreds of thousands or even millions.
But the money is nothing compared to the hassle of developing private land.
Therefore, from the day Xiangjiang was opened, in order to solve the problem of dense population and less land but more people, Xiangjiang built tall buildings on one hand and asked for land from the sea on the other.
Over the past few decades, 75 square kilometers have been gained from reclamation, which is larger than the area of two Haojiang rivers and close to 6.7% of Hong Kong's land area.
The Kai Tak Airport next to the Kowloon Walled City was created through reclamation.
It turns out that Kai Tak Airport was originally the Eagle Army Air Force Base and was converted into a dual-use airport in 1936.
Later, after several rounds of reclamation, the size of Kai Tak Airport gradually expanded.
In 1958, a new runway with a length of 2,194 meters extending from Kowloon Bay to Victoria Harbor was opened. In 1970, in order to accommodate the takeoff and landing of a new generation of large passenger aircraft, such as the Boeing 747, the runway was increased to 2,541 meters, and then the length of the runway was extended to 3,390 meters. meters, its area reaches 2.14 square kilometers.
but!
Because Kai Tak Airport has already extended into Victoria Harbour, considering the safety of the waterway, Kai Tak Airport cannot be expanded indefinitely.
So the Hong Kong government started the international airport project, which was also a land reclamation project.
It is located on an artificial island in the north of Lantau Island, which was formed by leveling Chek Lap Kok and filling in the adjacent seabed.
After the completion of the international airport, it not only added 9.38 square kilometers of land to Hong Kong, but also brought great economic value, making Hong Kong's passenger and cargo volume climb to the forefront of the world.
Another representative work of Hong Kong reclamation is the Kwai Chung Container Terminal. The birth of the Kwai Chung Container Terminal is a sign that Hong Kong shipping has entered the container era.
In 1985, the throughput of Kwai Chung Container Terminal successfully ranked among the three largest container ports in the world.
In 1986, it surpassed the Port of New York and ranked second. In 1987, it surpassed Rotterdam and ranked first in the world.
Later, in order to solve the contradiction between the surge in cargo volume and the relatively lagging port facilities, Kwai Chung Port continued to reclaim land and built the sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth piers successively, making it the busiest terminal in Hong Kong and even Asia.
In addition to industrial and commercial land, reclamation in Xiangjiang has also improved the living environment of residents.
Beginning in the 1970s, in order to alleviate the dense population in the old urban areas, large-scale new town construction activities were launched in the coastal areas of the New Territories.
Most of these newly established towns were built on land reclamation. The most representative ones are Tsuen Wan, Shatin and Tuen Mun.
For example, more than a quarter of the total area of 17 square kilometers in Shatin urban area is obtained from reclamation.
In addition, many places for residents to rest and have fun were also created from land reclamation. For example, the largest park on Hong Kong Island, Victoria Park, is located in the Causeway Bay Reclamation Area.
In short, the development of Xiangjiang is inseparable from the reclamation project. It not only provides a large amount of urban land, but also meets the needs of the upgrading of important facilities such as airports, ports, and land channels.
It also created huge financial revenue and operating profits.
Because the population in Hong Kong is too dense, it can be said that every inch of land is precious. The British Hong Kong government can harvest a huge amount of money just by selling the land obtained from reclamation.
Of course, large-scale reclamation will also have many negative effects. For example, reclamation in places such as Kowloon has reduced the water area of Victoria Harbor, narrowed the channel, and weakened tidal power, thus threatening the safety of ships traveling back and forth.
Reclamation will also cause environmental problems such as deterioration of water quality and loss of habitats for marine animals and plants. This problem was mentioned in the movie "Mermaid" by Star Master. Because of human reclamation, mermaids no longer even have a place to live.
But there is one thing to say!
In real time and space, a big reason why Hong Kong's economic development slowed down a lot after its return was because after 1997, there were too many critical voices, which led to the cessation of Hong Kong's reclamation operations.
Urban development requires land. Green land and mountainous areas are difficult to develop because they are private lands, and large-scale reclamation has been stopped.
Millions of people in Xiangjiang can only squeeze into a small space. If they want to expand, they have no place to go. They can only move inward crazily, causing the gap between the rich and the poor to continue to widen, and citizens complain.
"I know that the northern metropolitan area will be in great difficulty due to land issues, so we have to cut the thorns quickly and take advantage of the rare martial law period to clean up areas such as Yuen Long and Fanling and get the land use rights in our hands."
Lei Weidong clenched his fists and smashed the North Road, "This opportunity must never come again. Mr. Huo, Mr. Dong, if you miss this rare opportunity now, then you will want to develop the north and turn it into a northern metropolitan area. Within twenty years, There’s no need to think about it.”
"In this way, Mr. Lei, you will bear all the infamy." Seeing the firm look in Lei Weidong's eyes, it was obvious that his mind had been made up, Mr. Dong reminded.
"No one is perfect. My reputation in Xiangjiang is too high. If I don't do something to harm others and benefit myself, and lower my reputation, everyone will not trust me. And I don't need to attack everyone. I only need to deal with dozens of people." Rich locals and a few wealthy families.
I just need to be polite first and then attack with a knife in one hand and a banknote in the other. It should be easy to handle. "
"If we can't handle it, some people will not give up their lives for the land, so why would they ask for money?" Mr. Dong reminded.
"If you risk your life for the sake of the land, it's easy to deal with it." Lei Weidong shrugged, "These people are local snakes, and they are the bosses in the countryside.
All enlightened landlords are landlords, and I don't believe they made any mistakes in the past.
In the past, they were allowed to escape because they could not be arrested without evidence.
Now it is under military control, and people can be arrested without evidence. If that doesn't work, they can mobilize the masses to fight against the landlords. Just like in the mainland, it is easy to get rid of the landlords.
(End of chapter)
