Articles

Why we say the Victoria Harbour is an irreplaceable and irrecoverable special asset as well as a natural heritage of the Hong Kong people?

Richard Yu

People's necessitated Breakaway Space

The people of Hong Kong have dreamed for a part of their homeland which is genuinely theirs. It is only with such an uncommon venue that people will begin to engender a true communal spirit, where five hundred thousand souls will echo in unison when they see the bursting fireworks together.... This is the dream place of eternal Hong Kong.

Hong Kong is a city renowned for its harbour, but how many people have actually seen the sea today? Not many we fear. The Victoria Harbour has not disappeared, of course, but rather systematically blocked by a variety of structures, that deny people's right of access to the natural heritage. The Victoria Harbour is the largest 'Open Space' of Hong Kong but was veiled from most people's daily life because there is no way to get in touch with it. Hong Kong people have been fed up with the 'High-density', 'High-rise' environment, the most lacked urban attribute is in fact 'Space'!

Hong Kong is disoriented in its endless businesses, and left its people with no breathing space. Everybody hurries on, bustling past each other at a hastly pace. Few people can slow down and take a break from their routine businesses to savour and relish what all they have already possessed, and what has bestowed on them by the nature - experience the vastness of the sea, enjoy its breeze and serenity, and feel the immenseness of heaven and earth. The harbour should be a solitude space which soothe the bustling, allowing the public to meditate and enjoy the tranquillity. The extraordinary scene and the convivial activities around shall enrich each other.

Hong Kong needs a space where it can obtain all these back. This space is not an ordinary place, it is most unworldly, majestic and sacred. This is a "love at first sight" world-class waterfront. Let the Harbour be returned to its people, once again! Hong Kong people had been deprived of opportunity to enjoy the openness and beauty of the Harbour, although it is always there. It is just there, serene and tranquil, requesting nothing from you, not luring you to shop nor to spend, except perhaps your accompaniment. An open shore which leads to nothing but the harbour will shift people's focus, and thereby imagination, from secular concerns back to the harbour, the beautiest natural gift of Hong Kong.

Hong Kong people have never experienced a vast and seemingly boundless space within their reach, for them to stretch out and enjoy. Overlooked by the Government in the past, our Harbour is in fact of such a significance and special attraction that it had become a symbol of Hong Kong and an international tourism hotspot. We believe that it is equally important for Hong Kong to have a decent physical front-garden to portray ourselves internationally.

From a physical perspective, the Victoria Harbour area is both locationally and morphologically the centre of Hong Kong. While harnessing the best vistas and accessible (both physically and visually) from most parts of the city, it should be reserved for civic and leisure use by all Hong Kong people and under no circumstances should it be bitten away for commercial developments.

Such an environment shall exhibit a trait and quality that will not discolour even after 50 years. We believe the beauty of the Victoria Harbour is a treasure of Hong Kong, an irreplaceable and irrecoverable special asset and natural heritage of the Hong Kong people. The Victoria Harbour is the place we shall see Hong Kong to evolve in future. Yet it is not far away from us, if we want it, we embrace it and it is here today.

Key to a Precious Man-Land Relationship

A good place is not made but exists. It assumes its name from the hearts of the people. A place shall be a place if only it is liked by people, prided by people and enjoyed by people.

A good place do not belong to a particular city, region or nation; it is actually a place of the world and property of the whole humanity! We believe that place is made a place not by its physical mass but by the meaning it builds into the hearts of its people!

The Victoria Harbour is a whereabout that belonged to all and reacheable by all, it should not only be the rendezvous of the elite, but the 'place-to-go' of the most humble as well.

We acknowledge that the beauty and attraction of the Victoria Harbour is composed of images and vistas people perceived, which is registered as mental imprints in the collective memory of a place. Recent environmental researches have demonstrated that there is an implicit linkage between our sense of identity and orientation with our ability to appreciate natural features, especially those landmarks far away. The possibility for people to see natural features in the background would enhance one's sense of orientation and psychological health. Such opportunity for instant Man-Land interaction is precious, even by world standard.

In fact, the notion of the Victoria Harbour is not simply equal to the physical extent of the water, distant views of the hill ridges around also come to play. It is more this rich inter-play of visual connections amongst the 3-dimensional space, the land and the sea that has contributed to the exceptional beauty of the Victoria Harbour. Therefore it is surely a heritage and asset of the public which deserves our watchful conservation.

Furthermore, the Victoria Harbour complemented by buildings and ridgeline of the city had been forming a special cityscape and hence a typical image of Hong Kong. The land-sea components form an interesting dyad, which give a coherent and balanced image of the Victoria Harbour. Indeed, the image of the Victoria Harbour is not solely constituted by the landmark buildings, but the classic vista of urban Hong Kong and Kowloon, supplemented by the landscape (i.e. The surrounding hill ridges).

The Harbour and its relations to the Developments around is an important aspect pertaining to the vibrancy and vitality of our city. Nevertheless, one must acknowledge that the whole of which belongs to the Public Domain.

Scenery and Vistas, similar to other forms of natural heritages, are irreplaceable and irrecoverable resources. The value of the Scenery and Vistas lies in the opportunities where they could be seen, and the value will just becoming even greater if they can be seen simultaneously by a large number of people. Besides that they (and the way of accessing them including visually) should be protected they should not be 'reserved'for an exclusive class of people. 'Privatizing' Scenery and Vistas while blocking other's equal rights to enjoy the same is ethically unacceptable. Natural Scenery and Vistas are to be opened to all lay people, the key is on the common mass.

Specifically, the prevalent unhealthy trend for the encroachment of super high-rise buildings on the two sides of the harbour had narrowed substantially the visual width of the space contiguous to the harbour, blocked the prominent ridges (the Victoria Peak in Hong Kong Island and the Lion Rock in Kowloon) of the two sides from view and reduce the visual accessibility of people from the neighbouring districts to the harbour. The latter effect is particularly implicative since it infringes the egalitarian principle by letting some people to 'Privatize' a part of the harbour vista, forgoing the rights of visual access of the same by others. We hope that by keeping the 3-dimensional urban form in a concordant manner with the natural topography, the connection between nature and human would be maintained. The Government has to be clear that building a livable Hong Kong for its people is the true aim of all its kaleidoscopic future plans and studies.

Excellent Fung Shui Configuration

The concept of Chinese Fung Shui is to create a harmonized environment in which people can live comfortably. The ideal Fung-Shui Landscape is a town embraced all-round by hills with water flowing through thereby creating a subtle 'balance' (or 'Dynamic Equilibrium') between hills and flatlands, land and water, calm and turbulent, natural and artificial features.

The city of Hong Kong fits astonishingly well with the Fung Shui Concept. From the centre of the city, one could command the best view of the city with a green backdrop and enjoy the embracement of the hills.

From a visual standpoint, both sides of the Harbour are sheltered by a series of undulating hills, with a highly urbanized metro-area built along both sides of the harbour. It is indeed undeniable that the natural encircling hills particularly the Victoria Peak in the Hong Kong island and the Lion Rock in the Kowloon peninsula had been playing significant roles in complementing and contributing to the view and meaning of the Victoria Harbour.

Topographically, Hong Kong is special in a sense that its core area is transversed in the centre by an east-west delineated harbour while encircled nearly in all sides by hill ridges. Together such features have formed a distinctive bowl-shaped landscape, an auspicious form which is remarkably rich in visual qualities. The 3-dimensional configuration of all of such spatial elements and the resultant tacit spatial relations amongst themselves have led to a very rare sort of kaleidoscopic urban imagery when viewed from different angles.

This characteristic is what made the scenery of the Victoria Harbour so famous in the world. It is also because of such specific qualities, the urban fabric of Hong Kong is different from most other cities in the world. In a typical city, without a topographical backdrop made up by encircling hills, there is no need to mind the height of buildings in the city centre, since it would not be blocking anything. Moreover, the high-rise buildings clustered around the city centre would be viewed from afar as an 'artificial hill' and landmark, which might even be desirable in urban design terms. Nonetheless, the reverse is here in Hong Kong. There is the Victoria harbour in the middle of the urban area functioned effectively as an 'open-space' (in spatial sense) or breathing space between the waterfronts.

From the angle for the protection of the victoria Harbour, the Harbour is a Heritage because of aesthetics and vista. However, the only consideration so far within public focus is on preserving the physical size of the existing harbour. It is nevertheless realized that preserving the sheer physical size of the existing harbour would mean very little if there is no simultaneous efforts to conserve the harbour vista as well. But, is that the meaning of the Harbour just confined to the stipulated area of sea water plus its air space, or indeed there should be a deeper level of implications? Judging from this angle, reclamation is strictly speaking not the only cause of damaging the view of the Harbour. The high-rise buildings that rise above the reclaimed land should be the real damager to blame. The ridges on both sides of the Victoria Harbour (notably the Victoria Peak and the Lion Rock) are very significant natural features offering a backdrop to the urban scenery, and help shaping the image of Hong Kong. They should be allowed to act as significant landmarks continually and unimpededly, which shall in any case not be substituted by other 'landmark' buildings. Particularly when the little remaining ridgeline around the Harbour is now being more and more treasured by people of Hong Kong when so much of it was consecutively blocked by inconsiderate skyscrapers, any further unsympathetic protrusion against the skyline or harbour would just be an offending act.

From a mechanistic perspective, the proliferation of very high-rise buildings will certainly upset the visual 'penetrability' of reaching the topographical backdrop of the encircling hills and the general 'spaciousness' of the Victoria Harbour entirely. On the other hand, if the harbour vista is not blocked by super high-rise buildings in the front, the view of the harbour can be 'shared' by a much larger group of viewers from a much larger catchment area, giving rise to a much more 'public' and 'communual' character for the harbour.

Such delicate, even metaphysical state of equilibrium of Man-Land Relationship is therefore an important aspect for the planning of the city. We believe that good forms are derived, not created. New buildings at prominent location should try to address the existing urban form and endowing it with meaningful spatial relationships. The essense is 'Everything is relating to everything else' rather than a standalone masterpiece. Thus the city would be able to achieve a more 'Human', 'Interesting' and 'Architectonic' urban form.

The key to success now lies in the hands of the Government. A determined planning shall prove the Government's long term conviction and commitments in shaping the 3-dimentional urban form of Hong Kong and the protection of the harbour with its vistas as an important public asset and heritage.

We aspire to make the Victoria Harbour a world-class and world-famous waterfront, letting all the specialities of Hong Kong be showcased to the World. Through this 'window' lets the world appreciate the cultures, customs and practices of this place, and through this 'window' let us see afar.

All herein are what makes Hong Kong fascinating to the hearts of the millions with a mix-and-match personality, where Tradition meets Modernity, Antiquity meets Fashion, the East meets the West, Liveliness meets Solemnity. There is greatness in the pettiness and in the grandeur sees its speciality.

The nature, the scenery, the mountains, the sea and sunshine silhouetting against the ever-changing Hong Kong, from the Past to the Present, and into the future, symbolize the spirit of this versatile city: March Forward, Never Give Up. In our minds we know what is about to come, an arduous past awaiting a magnificent and rewarding future. Therefore responsive actions would be the only recipe to all of the above concerns which would return to the people of Hong Kong an attractive harbour with beautiful scenery, making Hong Kong once again a true 'Pearl of the Orient' to shine anew in the new millennium.

The chances are few, but the chances are now in our hands, it is only with the blessing of the public will such an urban dream be eventually fulfilled. Could we act promptly so that our city will not only prosper, but be good to live in and nice to look at, too?