SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong authorities have ordered all lift contractors to review the design and construction of landing doors installed over the past 10 years, after a government investigation found missing fire-safety components in lifts in at least 78 private buildings and two public estates. The director of the
SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong’s next phase of development should make room for both butterflies and buildings, conservationist Dr Yau Wing-kwong has said, arguing that biodiversity can be incorporated into parks, schools and neighbourhoods without holding back the city’s growth. Yau, founder of Environmental Associatio
SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong authorities have ordered the developer of the One Stanley luxury estate to inspect eight more houses – including one acquired by a Mongolian mining tycoon’s family – and the common area of a flat, in the wake of a scandal involving alleged substandard works at a building in the residential
SCMP Business
Henderson Land Development is banking on demand for premium offices to support its HK$63 billion (US$8.03 billion) Central Yards project, as tenants gravitate towards top-tier buildings even while much of Hong Kong’s office market remains weak. Jane Street’s decision last year to take about 70 per c
SCMP Business
Chinese billionaire Cao Dewang, whose glass-making empire was featured in the Oscar-winning documentary American Factory, has urged Chinese investors expanding overseas to respect local laws, regulations and culture, drawing on decades of experience building a global manufacturing business amid shif
SCMP Business
Shenzhen Transsion Holdings drew a lukewarm response for its HK$3.36 billion (US$428 million) Hong Kong share offering, heightening worries over market sentiment for new listings in the fourth quarter. The maker of Africa’s bestselling phones closed its bookbuilding on Monday, with preliminary figur
SCMP Business
China has begun building the world’s first utility-scale power plant combining two emerging technologies: supercritical carbon dioxide (CO2) generation and large-scale molten salt energy storage. The Ruitan project, under construction at a coal-fired power station in Yantai in eastern China’s Shando
SCMP Hong Kong
The Hong Kong Bar Association has suggested capping the number of proxies a person can hold at homeowners’ meetings, without restricting who may act as a proxy, stressing that improving transparency and introducing an electronic voting system could help to deter abuse in large-scale maintenance proc
SCMP Hong Kong
Lawmakers and engineering sector leaders have called for a review of Hong Kong’s building inspection mechanism and a blacklist to bar errant contractors from government tenders, after Hong Kong’s first privately built “starter homes” project hit a snag over shoddy steel work. The government should r
SCMP Hong Kong
Three of the six residential buildings at CK Asset’s “starter homes” project in Hong Kong will be demolished and rebuilt in what the developer called the most “time-saving” solution, two years after a scandal over substandard steel reinforcement work halted construction. The Buildings Department con
SCMP Hong Kong
Firefighters are battling a rooftop blaze at a residential building in Hong Kong’s Mong Kok, with thick black smoke billowing into the sky. The Fire Services Department received a report at about 5.20pm on Tuesday that items stored on the rooftop of a 26-storey block at Shun King Building on Nelson
SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong will strengthen its regulatory regime and impose stiffer penalties to ensure strong deterrence against building violations, the city leader has pledged, following a series of substandard construction scandals including the latest controversy involving a luxury residential development in St
SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong’s building authorities should consider inspecting the remaining properties in a luxury residential development and tightening work process documentation after one house was found to have used insufficient steel bars during construction, experts have said. Their suggestions followed the Bui
SCMP Hong Kong
Small independent bookstores tucked away in walk-up tenement buildings above neon-lit streets have long made Mong Kok a sanctuary for Hong Kong book lovers, until recently when one after another was forced to close due to economic headwinds or political uncertainty. Defying the trend, 41-year-old bi
SCMP Hong Kong
Authorities have launched a probe into the building quality of a luxury residential development in one of Hong Kong’s most expensive neighbourhoods in the Southern district after receiving a complaint from an owner that insufficient steel bars were used during construction. The Buildings Department
SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong police are searching for a Chinese woman after a man’s body was found on a chair outside a commercial building in Tsim Sha Tsui early on Thursday. Officers also arrested a 28-year-old bar staff member and charged him with illegally handling a corpse. He told police he had helped the woman
SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong building maintenance consultants and contractors prosecuted or convicted of integrity-related offences in the past three years will be excluded from pre-qualified lists set up for owners undertaking renovation projects, the development minister has said. Secretary for Development Bernadett
HK Free Press
From a distance, it looks as though a giant spaceship has just landed in the palm tree-dotted streets near downtown Los Angeles. It could also be a wide-canopied tree or a low passing cloud — but for its Chinese architect Ma Yansong, as long as the building “sparks curiosity”, he&#
SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong’s plan to raise its gold holdings will further cement the city’s status as an international financial centre, with the possibility of building vaults in the Northern Metropolis megadevelopment, according to authorities. Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po also said on Thursday the city was
SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong’s leader has pledged to overhaul the city’s building maintenance regime and improve emergency response as part of the government’s response to last year’s fatal Tai Po fire, while authorities study criminalising bid-rigging and plan to submit a proposal later this year. The measures were o
HK Free Press
Hong Kong authorities will “pursue accountability” over faulty construction works that resulted in tilted lift shafts in a redeveloped building at Queen Mary Hospital, leader John Lee has said. “Regarding the misaligned lifts at Queen Mary Hospital, this must be corrected swiftly,” Lee said at
SCMP Tech & Innovation
The shipbuilding and maintenance arm of state-owned marine transport giant China Cosco Shipping has completed initial public offering (IPO) guidance registration, paving the way for a domestic listing to capitalise on a global shipbuilding boom. Cosco Shipping Heavy Industry finished its pre-IPO reg
HK Free Press
Three activists who once organised annual vigils to mark the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown crackdown have been sentenced up to seven years and three months in prison. Appearing before a panel of designated judges at the West Kowloon Law Courts Building on Friday, Chow Hang-tung, Lee Cheuk-yan, and Albert
SCMP Hong Kong
The educational ethos of “cultivating values and nurturing people” is based on a classic Chinese saying that emphasises building good morals and a sense of social responsibility alongside academic and technical knowledge. At the Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK), this ethos drives the instit
SCMP Hong Kong
Hong Kong’s Buildings Department has filed 259 charges against two companies and four individuals over major renovation works at the inferno-ravaged Wang Fuk Court, after investigations found non-fire-retardant materials were used and safety obligations were not met. The department said on Wednesday
HK Free Press
Hong Kong’s Buildings Department (BD) has launched more than 200 prosecutions against four individuals and two companies that were responsible for overseeing renovation works at fire-hit Wang Fuk Court when a deadly blaze tore through the estate last year. The 259 charges, covering the use of defect
HK Free Press
Three Hong Kong Tiananmen vigil activists convicted under the national security law will be sentenced this Friday, with each of them facing maximum penalties of 10 years behind bars. Chow Hang-tung, Lee Cheuk-yan and Albert Ho will appear at the West Kowloon Law Courts Building, according to the Jud
HK Free Press
Hong Kong’s development chief has said that government contractors will bear the full repair costs for faulty lift work in a redeveloped building at Queen Mary Hospital that resulted in tilted elevator shafts. Secretary for Development Bernadette Linn also said on Tuesday that the government reserve
SCMP Hong Kong
About three months after Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu visited Central Asia, momentum is building for closer economic ties between the city and the region, with potential cooperation extending beyond finance to tourism, professional services, mining, agriculture and digital infrastructu
HK Free Press
When the General Post Office was built in Central half a century ago, conservationists mourned the loss of the building it replaced. The old General Post Office was a marvel of Edwardian architecture: sweeping archways and granite veranda pillars beneath a distinctive façade of rose-coloured Amoy br