1. LSGI 4321
Geo-information for Urban and
Regional Studies
Individual Essay
“There is a recent public outcry to curb unauthorized developments in
Hong Kong’s beautiful countryside. Please suggest effective means to
detecting, monitoring and prosecuting unauthorized developments in
rural areas.”
Student‟s Full Name: Tsang Hiu Lam
Student‟s I.D.: 09296872D
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2. Introduction
Recently, the operator of the Shrine, a columbarium situated at Yuen Long, was
confirmed by the Court that it had violated planning rules (South China Morning Post,
2011). Apart from the court case of the Shrine, several unauthorized developments in
Ma Shi Chau and Sai Wan were also reported by the local mass media in 2009 and 2010
respectively. These reports have raised the public‟s concern about unauthorized
developments in rural areas of Hong Kong. Such environmental groups as Association
for Geo-conservation Hong Kong and Hong Kong Bird Watching Society even urge the
government to put more efforts on prosecution of unauthorized developments to
enhance the effectiveness of local environmental conservation (AM730, 2011).
In this essay, the Town Planning Ordinance will be first introduced, followed by the
definition and possible impacts of unauthorized development. Means to detect, monitor
and prosecute unauthorized development in rural areas of Hong Kong will then be
discussed. A conclusion will be given at the last part of the essay.
Town Planning Ordinance and Unauthorized Developments
Town Planning Ordinance (Cap. 131)
In order to promote the health, safety, convenience and general welfare of the
community by making provisions for the systematic preparation and approval of plans
for the future layout of existing and potential urban areas, Town Planning Ordinance
(“the Ordinance”) was first enacted in 1939 (Fung, 2005).
In 1991, a major amendment to the Ordinance was made so as to extend the jurisdiction
of planning legislation to the entire territory of Hong Kong (Lai, Ho and Leung, 2010),
which empowered the Planning Authority to take enforcement action against
unauthorized developments in rural areas of the New Territories. The Ordinance was
further amended in 2004 to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of planning
enforcement control in the rural New Territories.
Before the Ordinance was revised in 2004, the Planning Authority has been
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3. experiencing different difficulties in handling some enforcement cases due to several
technical deficiencies in the legislation. For instance, after an enforcement notice on an
unauthorized development is issued by the Planning Authority, the operator concerned
may apply for planning permission to regularize the unauthorized development (Fung,
2005). As an appeal is lodged by the operator concerned, the Planning Authority can
only take further actions after the decision on the appeal is announced. Therefore,
further amendments were made to the Ordinance in 2004 to remove these technical
loopholes. Such amendments will be further discussed in the part of “Prosecution of
Unauthorized Development” in this essay.
Unauthorized Development
According to the Planning Department (2011), “the Ordinance empowers the Town
Planning Board to designate development permission areas (DPAs) and to prepare
statutory plans for these areas. Land within an area covered by either a DPA plan or an
outline zoning plan (OZP) which has replaced a DPA plan is subject to statutory planning
control and the provisions on enforcement under the Ordinance”.
Under the Ordinance, no person shall undertake or continue development within a DPA
unless:-
I. the development is an "Existing Use";
II. the development is permitted under the relevant statutory plan; or
III. the development has been granted a valid planning permission under the
Ordinance
where a DPA is an area designated in a plan prepared under Sections 3(1)(b) and 20 of
the Ordinance but does not include land included in a plan of an interim DPA; and
"existing use" in relation to a DPA is a use of a building or land that was in existence
immediately before the publication in the Gazette of notice of the draft plan of the DPA.
Possible Impacts Brought by Unauthorized Developments
The unauthorized developments in rural areas of the New Territories usually include
conversion of agricultural land to other uses like open storage of construction materials
or machinery, container depots, car parks and workshops as well as filling of land, filling
of pond or excavation of land without planning permission (Planning Department, 2011).
Apart from violating the statutory plans, such unauthorized developments may also
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4. damage the natural environment and lead to such problems as flooding, pollution, traffic
congestion and nuisance to nearby residents. As a result of these serious impacts on
the environment and the community, enforcement against unauthorized developments
is essential to curb further degradation of the rural environment in the territory.
Detection of Unauthorized Developments
Unauthorized developments in rural areas of Hong Kong can be detected by change
detection techniques of remote sensing.
Land Use Change Detection
Singh (1989) defines change detection as the process of identifying differences in the
state of an object or phenomenon by observing it at different times. The basic principle in
using remotely sensed data for change detection is that changes in the objects of
interest will result in changes in reflectance values or local textures separable from
changes caused by other factors, for example, differences in atmospheric conditions,
illumination, viewing angles and soil moistures (Wang, Qin and Li, 2006). In the other
words, it is necessary to collect satellite images on a regular time-scale basis for
performing change detection.
A wide variety of techniques have been developed for change detection. They are
mainly divided into six categories: Algebra, Transformation, Classification, Advanced
Models, GIS and Visual Analysis (Lu, Mausel and Moran, 2003). Among these change
detection techniques, Post-classification under the Classification category is one of the
most common approaches for change detection in practice.
Classification Technique – Post-classification
According to Deer (2000), post-classification is the most obvious method of detecting
change, which involves the classification of each of the images independently, followed
by a comparison of the corresponding pixel (thematic) labels to identify areas where
change has occurred. The key factor of performing post-classification is to select
sufficient training sample data for classification.
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5. Post-classification can be performed in supervised or unsupervised manners.
Supervised classification is that a human analyst indicates a number of areas of an
image and identifies what they are with collateral knowledge. The computer then
identifies the characteristics of the data that comprise each type or area, and classifies
the remaining image pixels in accordance with the identified type to which they are most
similar. For an unsupervised classification, the computer clusters or partitions the data
without prior knowledge of classes, and thematic labels are applied, through collateral
knowledge, at a subsequent stage (Deer, 2000).
Post-classification can minimize the impacts of atmospheric, sensor and environmental
differences between multi-temporal images. It can also provide a complete matrix of
change information (Lu, Mausel and Moran, 2003). Nonetheless, there are several
drawbacks and limitations regarding post-classification approach:
I. The final accuracy of classification depends on the quality of the classified image of
each date.
II. A lot of time and expertise are required to create classification products. Besides,
classification techniques are relatively expensive. There is normally a substantial
requirement for „ground truthing‟ to reduce uncertainty and error. Unsupervised
classification, whilst possibly reducing the costs, is prone to higher error rates (Deer,
2000).
III. Any subsequent classification and comparison is effectively constrained to the initial
set of class labels.
IV. Some objects may be unclassified and misclassified (Wang, Qin and Li, 2006).
Notwithstanding the fact that humans are stronger in discerning patterns and shapes,
computers, which are better at quantitative analysis than human, can also assist in
comparing separately classified images. If computers are used to compare images, GIS
can be used together with post-classification as a hybrid change detection method to
improve classification results (Lu, Mausel and Moran, 2003) as GIS approaches are
effective in dealing with change detection analysis using multi-source data.
Monitoring of Unauthorized Development
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6. To effectively prevent unauthorized developments in rural New Territories, the Central
Enforcement and Prosecution Section (CEPS) of the Planning Department undertakes
the day-to-day duties in relation to the enforcement and prosecution against
unauthorized developments (Planning Department, 2011). By regular site patrols and
observation of aerial photos, CEPS can confirm whether there is an unauthorized
development in a specific location. Besides the Planning Department, the Lands
Department also acts on receipt of complaints or referrals regarding unauthorized
developments.
Apart from the above government departments, citizens in Hong Kong can also take
part in monitoring unauthorized development in the territory. They can report a
suspected unauthorized development to the Planning Department by phone, letter, fax
or e-mail. CEPS of the Department will then investigate and action accordingly -
inspections on any suspected unauthorized development will be carried out and a reply
will be given by CEPS within 4 weeks on receipt of the report (Planning Department,
2011).
Aerial Photos and Satellite Positioning
After receiving complaints of suspected unauthorized developments, the relevant
government departments can have an overview of the site area of the suspected
unauthorized development with aerial photos. Before carrying out on-site investigations,
one can check such information as coordinates and boundaries of the site area by using
GIS after locating the suspected unauthorized development visually.
To obtain the accurate location of the suspected unauthorized development, satellite
positioning can be used to locate the extent of suspected unauthorized development
(Lands Department, 2010). The surveyed extent of the suspected unauthorized
development can then be compared promptly with the map and information stored in the
mobile GIS. With equipments from GPS devices to laser rangefinders, the efficiency of
on-site investigations can be enhanced significantly.
Prosecution of Unauthorized Development
According to the Town Planning Ordinance, a person who commits an offence of
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7. unauthorized development and is liable, he or she can be fined up to $500,000.00 in the
case of a first conviction. If it is a second or subsequent conviction, he or she can be
fined up to $1,000,000.00.
As mentioned before, the Planning Authority has experienced a wide range of technical
difficulties in carrying out its duties since it has been empowered to take enforcement
action against unauthorized developments in the rural New Territories in 1991. As a
consequence, the Ordinance was further amended in 2004 to protect the rural areas
and minimize adverse environmental impacts on the residents of these areas (Planning
Department, 2004). The following are several examples of amendments made to the
Ordinance in 2004:
I. power to enter any land or premises (except domestic premises) or to have access
via any land or premises (except domestic premises) for investigations on
suspected unauthorized development;
II. in forming an opinion on whether there is an unauthorized development, the
Authority shall refer to aerial photos taken by the Lands Department, the relevant
statutory plans and other relevant information; and
III. upon the service of a notice under Section 23(1), the notice recipient should
discontinue the unauthorized development within a specified period. The
submission of a planning application for regularizing the unauthorized development
will not be taken as a reasonable step to comply with the notice as is allowed before
the amendment was made.
With a view to stop such annoying and destructive unauthorized developments, priority
guidelines for enforcement action against unauthorized developments in the rural New
Territories have been set up accordingly. High priority will be given to the following
examples of unauthorized developments which (Planning Department, 2006):
I. are within or in the proximity of ecologically sensitive and important areas and
conservation zones;
II. involve filling of land/pond within "Agriculture" zone;
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8. III. cause adverse environmental nuisances to nearby residential clusters of substantial
size; and
IV. involves uses not in line with those approved by the Town Planning Board.
Conclusion
To conclude, it is crucial for the Hong Kong government to safeguard the beautiful
countryside of the territory for the purposes of effective environmental conservation and
minimizing nuisance to residents of rural areas in the New Territories. As a result, the
government should allocate additional resources in assisting relevant departments to
detect, monitor and prosecute unauthorized developments in the rural New Territories.
Citizens should also be encouraged to report suspected unauthorized developments to
the government so as to protect the environment and ensure the safety of their
community.
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9. Reference
Lai, W. C., Ho, C. W. & Leung, H. F. (2010). Change in Use of Land - A Practical Guide to
Development in Hong Kong. : Hong Kong University Press
Cheung, C. F. & Lau, S. (2011, November 4). Court Confirms „Shrine‟ an Illegal
Columbarium. South China Morning Post
違例發展檢控率低 港生物保育不足. (2011, October 7). AM730
Fung, C. K. (2005). ew Planning System under Town Planning (Amendment) Ordinance
2004. Retrieved November 1, 2011 from
http://www.hkdf.org/newsarticles.asp?show=newsarticles&newsarticle=167
Enforcemnet of Unauthorized Developments in the Rural New Territories (2011).
Retrieved November 1, 2011 from HKSAR, Planning Department Web site:
http://www.pland.gov.hk/pland_en/info_serv/cep/enforcement/enforce.htm
Frequently Asked Questions (2011). Retrieved November 1, 2011 from HKSAR,
Planning Department Web site:
http://www.pland.gov.hk/pland_en/info_serv/faq/index.html#q9
Town Planning (Amendment) Ordinance 2004 - Information Pamphlet (2004). Retrieved
November 1, 2011 from HKSAR, Planning Department Web site:
http://www.pland.gov.hk/pland_en/tech_doc/tp_bill/pamphlet2004/index.html
Priority Guidelines for Enforcement Action against Unauthorized Developments in the
Rural New Territories (2006). Retrieved November 1, 2011 from HKSAR, Planning
Department Web site:
http://www.pland.gov.hk/pland_en/info_serv/cep/enforcement/priority.htm
Singh, A. (1989). Digital Change Detection Techniques Using Remotely-sensed Data.
International Journal of Remote Sensing, 10 989–1003
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10. Wang, J. M., Qin, W. Z. & Li, D. R. (2006). Object-oriented Per-parcel Land Use Change
Detection Integrating GIS and Remote Sensing
Lu, D., Mausel, P. & Moran, E. (2003). Change Detection Techniques
Deer, P. (2000). Digital Change Detection Techiques in Remote Sensing
The Hong Kong Satellite Positioning Reference Station - Data Services and Its
Applications (2010). Retrieved November 1, 2011 from HKSAR, Lands Department
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