Proposed Penjing and Bonsai Arboretum at Ma Hang Headland, Stanley

The Conservancy Association received a complaint in April 2004 from the Kwan Yin  Buddhist Monastery  that  the Housing Department was going to construct the car park of the arboretum right in front of the temple's entrance and lots of trees would be cut down. CA then knew that a large arboretum would be built and the project involved large scale tree felling, but the exact number could not be known till we received the tree felling schedule from Town Planning  through due process in August . According to the document, 542 out of 1047 trees on the headland were to be felled.

CA still wanted to negotiate with the concerned government departments and the developer, but to no avail. A local newspaper broke the story on 4 October but lacked details such as the number of trees to be cut down. CA held a press tour on the very same day and publicized the incident.

A press statement by the Housing Department said that the trees on the headland have low ecological value, but Leung Chin-man, Director of Housing, said he would review the project.

Representatives of CA and Leung Chin-man met on 6 October at HA Headquarters. Mr Leung promised that he would adopt an "all open" attitude towards reviewing the project; a tripartite working group involving the HA, CA and the developer would be established and provide more information on how the project came about.

The project proponent later withdrew from the plan. HA decided to transform the headland into a community park with nature conservation as its main theme, and organized two community workshops in late 2006 and early 2007 in which CA also took part. The park will be complete in 2010.

Back in 2004 the Kwun Yum Buddhist Monastery revealed to CA that they were devising an expansion plan; CA told them that we would oppose any plan with large development scale or footprint. The monastery applied to the Town Planning Board in April 08. They planned to construct a five-storey building (with two floors underground) including a parking lot with 30 spaces. The monastery claimed that the plot ratio was just 0.42. However, they included the adjoining land with an area of about 13 000m2 in the calculation of the GFA, but the land had already been earmarked for the community park. Thus the actual plot ratio should be 1.87.

CA arranged a meeting with HA to find out more about the situation, and HA said in the meeting that they did not support the monastery’s application. We also wrote to the Town Planning Board to oppose the expansion plan. We were of the view that the land zoned “Open Space” should not be included in the calculation of plot ratio and queried the need to build a parking lot. The development also involves large scale excavation and we were concerned that it would have negative impact on the surrounding environment.