SCMP 23 Jan 1999
Air quality will be so bad in 15 years that Hong Kong will become ¡§unliveable¡¨, environmental experts predicted yesterday. Quality was fast deteriorating to hazardous levels under present government control measures, said Dr William Barron of the Centre of Urban Planning and Environment Management at the University of Hong Kong. ¡§It will be a matter of 15 years before Hong Kong will become unliveable. But really depends on what you¡¦re willing to put up with.¡¨
¡§Bangkok is notorious for that but do we really want to live under such conditions?¡¨ Professor Peter Hills, who put the time-frame at 10 years, said poor air quality was driving away tourists on business. ¡§It is hard to justify Hong Kong being the third most expensive city with such an environment. ¡§Bits of Hong Kong are very cosmopolitan but I think it has a long way to go to being a first class city.¡¨
Releasing results of a two-year study on the environment ¡V ¡§Heading Towards Sustainability?¡¨ ¡V Dr Barron said the Environmental Protection Department (EPD) had been overburdened in its responsibility. ¡§Environmental quality cannot be left largely to the EPD which can typically only impose solutions further down the line when far more fundamental changes are needed. It cannot deal with the causes.¡¨ Not only were environmental measures ¡§too little, too late¡¨, but plans for the future were not far-reaching enough, Dr Barron said. He called for the Transport Bureau, Transport Department and Planning Department to take responsibility for the environment in their transport and urban developments.
Instead
of building more roads, funding for more environmentally friendly rail systems
should be reassessed to allow them to serve more people, he said. Professor
Hills said law enforcement should immediately be stepped up to address the problem.
¡§What is needed now are draconian measures. There are so many ordinances but
they are not really enforced. We need higher fines for cars emitting black smoke.
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