Article from Northcroft Hong Kong office
With the highest housing costs in the world and the housing supply-demand imbalance in Hong Kong, the Hong Kong Government is working hard to efficiently develop a number of transitional housing projects, to provide a bridge for the homeless from temporary housing to permanent housing. Typically, transitional housing is more private than other emergency homeless shelters.
One of the first large scale housing projects held its groundbreaking ceremony on 16 June, 2021 and was officially opened on 16 June, 2022 – exactly 1 year later! A number of dignitaries attended the official opening including Hong Kong Chief Executive, Ms Carrie Lam who was also present at the project’s groundbreaking ceremony.
Known as United Court, the newly opened transitional housing project provides 1800 units and social services support to grassroots families. The delivery time for this project has been phenomenally short and the Northcroft team was instrumental in ensuring it was delivered on time and on budget.
Leading the Northcroft team is Mr Kent Kam from the Hong Kong office. His team was originally tasked with preparing the tender documentation for United Court in November 2020. Construction began in May 2021 using modular integrated construction techniques (MiC) to ensure on-time delivery. Read more about this project here.
“We take immense pride in being involved in such ambitious and important transitional housing projects. Each one contributes enormous benefits to our society,” said Mr Kam.
A new way to build
Modular Integrated Construction (MiC) is becoming a highly viable and popular method of delivering newly constructed residences in a cost effective, timely and sustainable manner.
Building efficiency begins at the design stage where individual housing units are designed to be modular. This allows all components to be produced in bulk to reduce costs. Then the housing components are manufactured off-site and often assembled in well organised factories. For the United Court project, the housing components were produced inside China, near Hong Kong.
As a result, the only on-site work required is site preparation and assembly of all the building components, along with final connection to water, sewage and power services. The Northcroft team has vast experience in this style of construction which requires extensive forward planning and attention to detail to ensure successful and timely project completion.
While MiC homes are cost effective to build, they never compromise on safety. The United Court project has passed Hong Kong construction laws for:
- Fire safety and prevention
- Wind and noise protection
- Lighting and ventilation requirements
Another 4 transitional projects to deliver
With the extraordinary success of the United Court transitional housing project, Northcroft has been awarded the quantity surveying role for another 4 transitional housing projects.
In all, Northcroft will be responsible for delivering 5000 transitional houses out of a total of 20,000 units which the Hong Kong Government plans to build. In other words, Northcroft will be responsible for delivering 1 in 4 of Hong Kong’s transitional housing units. This is an achievement the Northcroft team is very proud to be a part of.
Each project will be funded by the Government and will be managed by NGOs in Hong Kong.
On 21 June this year, Mr Kam attended the groundbreaking ceremony for the next transitional housing project. Located near Hung Shui Kiu station, this project will provide 2 residential blocks, each 4 stories high. In all, 410 units will be built to accommodate approx. 786 people.
Northcroft was asked to assist with this ambitious project due to its experience in cost effectively managing large scale projects like this and for its knowledge of MiC building techniques.
In addition, the project has an impressive completion timeframe – only 320 days. But the Northcroft team is confident they have the processes in place to achieve the deadline.
Providing multi-disciplined expertise for local projects
When you choose Northcroft, you are choosing to work with a multi-disciplined team of construction experts. With offices across the world, we work together to delivery projects achieving international standards using local expertise.
If you have ambitious projects to plan and deliver, contact Northcroft.