Sham Shui Po - Government Public Housing

View of Sham Shui Po from HKOP studio - Impression from tiled photographs

This view of Sham Shi Po and Shep Kip Mei beyond is the view I have from my working space at the HKOP, and shows the impact that the public housing program has on the environment in HK. The sheer scale of these high rises is overwhelming - and impossible to convey in my drawings here. The start of this huge and ambitious public housing scheme was driven by the need to urgently re-house some 53,000 people after a fire broke out in the shanty town that existed right here in 1953; this prompted the then Colonial Governor to commence a program of high density housing as a solution to the problem which continues to this day. Poor housing and urban decay are one of the biggest problems facing the HK administration (there was an article today about residential housing shortfalls on the front page of the South China Morning Post). 
 

Le Corbusier - Concept for "the contemporary city" 1925

This “mega-structuralist” approach is reminiscent of the architect Le Corbusier’s concept for “the contemporary city” which he formulated back in 1925 as a radical new approach to urban planning (I’ve included one of his impressions to show the similarity between his concept drawings and the view from the studio). In the UK such schemes have proved highly unpopular, and many of the high rises that were built in the 1960’s have since been demolished.

To my western way of thinking, these buildings seem abhorrent - I am unable to get my head round the idea of living in them, and find it hard to walk the short distance from the MTR station to the print studio without my gaze turned upward in wonderment - and horror. These buildings are 40 storeys high! I feel more than slightly queasy when I look at the ground from the 8 floors up that the print studio is.

Machines for living in - High rise close-up

Maybe it will come as a surprise then that HK residents love them, and that those who do not yet live in such buildings aspire to do so. But HKers are ever pragmatic people, and this radical high density housing is a necessary solution where the population density is so great, and what land there is must be exploited to its fullest potential. It's a practical solution to a problem that isn't going to disappear, so why complain (seems to be how they see it).

What such housing does provide (and which was a fundamental part of Le Corbusier’s concept) is far more cost effective service provision for such a high population density.There are beautifully maintained shared spaces here and access to one of the most efficient transportation systems in the world, as well as to the shops and street cafés which are such an important part of HK life.

Sketch of view from HKOP - It's 8 storeys up so the perspective is quite strange!