RIP - 工業性進化: 九龍東變成香港的第一個'智能城市'的旅程

RIP - 工業性進化: 九龍東變成香港的第一個'智能城市'的旅程

Industrial evolution: Kowloon East’s journey to becoming Hong Kong’s first ‘smart city’

• From zero-carbon buildings to a new waterfront promenade, Kwun Tong is transforming from an industrial centre into a futuristic technology and creative hub

Smart technology, green rooftops, ubiquitous Wi-Fi, public art, creative industry... these are just a few of the things that come to mind when imagining what a ‘smart city’ might look like.

In Hong Kong, this urban vision is coming to life in an unlikely place: Kowloon East. Formerly an epicentre of manufacturing, the industrial district is set to become Hong Kong’s first smart city.

Since 2012, the Energizing Kowloon East Office (EKEO) has been ushering the area into the future through a series of revitalisation projects that includes zero-carbon buildings, smart technology, Grade A commercial towers and reimagined public spaces.

East side story 

In the 1950s, as Hong Kong transitioned into a manufacturing mecca, the government earmarked Kowloon East as the city’s industrial heart. To prepare Kowloon East for success, the government reclaimed land, and built factories, warehouses and satellite housing complexes.

Sometimes they had to stop in the middle of the street to let an airplane land at Kai Tak. Can you imagine?

PROFESSOR MEE KAM NG

“Kwun Tong was a reclaimed area [formerly salt fields] that played a very important role in the 1950s when Hong Kong experienced what we call a transferred industrialisation process,” says Professor Mee Kam Ng, a specialist in sustainable development and the director of the Chinese University of Hong Kong’s Urban Studies Programme.

The iconic Kai Tak International Airport, with its unforgettable landing on Victoria Harbour’s edge, sat in the centre of it all as a logistical hub. “If you talk to the older generation, they will tell you stories of walking to work. Sometimes they had to stop in the middle of the street to let an airplane land at Kai Tak. Can you imagine?”

But following the opening of mainland China in the late 1970s, many companies relocated their warehouses across the border in order to reduce operating costs. In the ensuing decades, Kwun Tong’s manufacturing industry declined and many old buildings were left to be revitalised.

Kwun Tong 2.0

In recent years, Kowloon East has seen another transformation, this time catapulting the district into the future as Hong Kong’s first smart city and second Central Business District.

https://m.scmp.com/native/lifestyle/arts-culture/topics/transformation-kowloon-east/article/2175265/industrial