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On 14th Oct 2018, 10000 Hong Kong protesters hold a rally from Causeway Bay to the Central Office, to protest the government 's plan to spend probably 1 trillion Hong Kong dollars to build artificial islands and accompanying bridges and tunnels in the East of Lantau Island.

The former "East Lantau Metropolis project" proposed to reclaim 1000 hectares , has been replaced this week by an even more ambitious project of "Lantau Tomorrow Vision " of reclaiming 1700 hectares to house 1.1million people by the Chief Executive Carrie Lam, preempting the awaited public consultation report by the Task Force on Land Supply.

The protestors worried the project has not considered the risks under extreme weather, will irreversibly damage the environment, burn up the whole fiscal reserve, and deprive the public of the funding for other more important fields like medical , education, and retirement scheme.

Moreover the project , requiring 2 to 3 decades to complete , cannot cater for the immediate housing needs of the general public, as compared to other source of land supply such as the Fanling Golf Course , brownfield sites and buy back farmland from private estate developers for public housing.

大约一萬名市民於十月十四日參與由銅鑼灣至政總的遊行 ,抗議政府計劃用一萬億元填海及興建東大嶼人工島方案。

示威者認為政府的明日大嶼計劃填海1700公頃及其他的橋樑或隧道, 將會對環境造成不可挽回的影響, 亦未有考慮到人工島能否應付極端的天氣, 財政上會用盡香港的儲備, 亦令到沒有足夠財政資源用於醫療、教育及全民退休保障等。

示威者亦不滿政府亦未有等待土地供應小組的咨詢結果便公佈填海作為主要選項。但填海需時20至30年才提供到1.1百萬人的住宅, 相反其他土地供應選項如收回粉嶺哥爾夫球場、粽地、及用官地收回條例收回地產發展商的農地作公營房屋卻能夠比較快提供到房屋。

__034 by Jan Schuil