The Belcher Bay harbourfront fully open by implementing ‘incremental approach’

Located at Shing Sai Road, Kennedy Town, the Belcher Bay harbourfront open space was fully opened on 19 October 2020, providing the public with a round-the-clock leisure space for enjoying a panoramic view of the western waters of Victoria Harbour and the sunset.

The project consists of a promenade and an adjacent open space, formerly a public cargo working area. It covers an area of about 5,900 square metres. The public can walk from Exit A of the Kennedy Town MTR Station to the harbourfront in about six minutes. The promenade is built with a boardwalk of 172 metres in length and was opened in March last year under the Government’s ‘incremental approach’.

Together with colourful weaving installations along the railing created by a local community design group and beautiful hoarding panels designed by an architectural teacher and students of Chu Hai College of Higher Education, the boardwalk has become a popular check-in spot in social media. In recent months, the Harbour Office of the Development Bureau (DEVB) and the Harbourfront Commission have further collaborated with local tour specialist ‘Walk in Hong Kong’ to organise a series of online programmes. This has allowed members of the public to learn more about this harbourfront site and its neighbourhood.

The remaining portion of the open space opened today provides facilities to allow the public to enjoy the harbourfront in an even more comfortable manner. These include sheltered seating area, landscaping and toilets, etc. The multipurpose space located at the centre is one of the special features of the site. Its activity platforms and seating area are produced mainly by wooden cargo pallets, allowing members of the public to enjoy the space in a versatile manner according to their imagination, be it a children’s playground or a performance stage.

Another special feature is that pet owners can bring their pets under leash and enjoy the facilities there together, or let their pets play freely inside the pet corner. Coupled with a selection of stamp art, visitors will encounter a brand new experience on the site. To promote environmental friendliness, the Harbour Office has also co-operated with Greeners Action to provide a Tetra Pak recycling bin for visitors to deposit their beverage cartons. The weaving installations previously displayed along the boardwalk have also appeared in a new form.

The hinterland side of the open space covering an area of about 2,000 square metres has been allocated to a non-governmental organisation, K-Farm, for operating an open community garden. It is the first urban leisure farm in Hong Kong that combines hydroponics, aquaponics and organic farming. Facilities in the first phase of the garden, including outdoor classrooms, a multipurpose area and farming racks, are open to the public today as well. A series of activities and classes will be convened progressively. The remaining part of the community garden is expected to gradually open next year.

“This project embodies multiple goals such as making good use of vacant harbourfront sites, implementation of an ‘incremental approach’, introduction of multiple harbourfront experiences, as well as open site management. We and the Harbourfront Commission are grateful for the opinions of different stakeholders and local personalities during the process. We will keep on pursuing these positive interactions in other harbourfront projects, and work together with the public in building a harbour for the community as a whole,” said a spokesman for the DEVB.  — Construction+ Online