Hong Kong Land Boundary Problems – A Synthesis4. Land boundary records Land boundary problems are technically land boundary record problems. Verifying lot boundaries in Hong Kong is just like verifying the title from the chain of deeds. To verify title in Hong Kong, it takes a trace of transaction history within 15 years. To verify land boundary in Hong Kong, it usually takes a trace back to the day of original grant. The motto “subject to best available evidence” gives a concise description on the redefinition survey operation – a surveyor has to search for all available boundary evidences. The efficiency of the survey system would be much improved if there is a central agency keeping all necessary boundary records – similar to that of a title register. In the urban area of Hong Kong Island and Kowloon Peninsula, real estate developments are prosperous. A typical life cycle of a building varies from 30 to 50 years. Not to mention historical or cultural records, at least the government has good survey records to trace back last development just a few decades ago. There are minor boundary discrepancies in urban lots where too many of them did not have completed lease survey procedure. The earlier the lots, the larger the area and the more chances of subdivisions; these early sectioning exercises served well for identification purpose but are insufficient to match the exact plan dimensions on ground. The New Territories, which previously was the rural area, developed new towns since the 1970’s and now houses a population of 3.2 million out of the total 6.9 million total population in Hong Kong [CEDD, 2006]. In new towns, the government resumed village house land and the surrounding agricultural land, and replaced them with new town lots; survey records are updated. For the old villages and agricultural lots, these are the land classified as Old Schedule Lots and New Grant Lots. The basic land boundary records were established during the Demarcation District Survey period from 1899 to 1904. In 1905, the government made 477 Block Crown Leases covering the New Territories. Afterwards, land sales were made piece by piece, and were termed New Grants. Those records are listed in Table 1. As the New Territories was only a borrowed land of a limited time, the previous New Territories Administration had no political interests to improve the crude land boundary records. Some severe area deficiency cases occurred. For examples, the Lintock case [Lintock v AG, 1985] decided that a registered 1.27 acres of agricultural lot was reduced to a 0.01 acre of house lot, and the Tam Mo Yin case [Tam et al v AG, 1995] showed a claim of 274,638 square feet of land in excess of the original land-sale area of 966,130 square feet in 1931. Typical land boundary record accuracy for agricultural land is about 2 to 4 meters. To use a land boundary to a pencil width is the attitude of a landowner today, yet the land boundary record was done 100 years ago. Running precise survey to administer land by present land use standard over a crude legal land boundary record is something in itself absurd. It worked for a long time when the government action was equivalent to law. In recent decades, landowners would take the government to court for land boundary disputes – when the involved benefits were large enough. Nowadays, land boundary surveys are performed by private land surveyors. Their services are highly professional but the survey result would not necessarily be accepted by government or acquired any definite legal effect. Usually, unnecessary land boundary disputes surfaced where the costs are bared by the small landowners. Large developers, with their political influences and bargaining power with government, have an edge to use land boundary defects to their advantage. In developing a large area a developer would seek all kinds of help from the Lands Department. One usual administrative tool is the “surrender and re-grant” such that old problematic lot boundaries were wiped out and a newly surveyed lot would be granted. 5. Concluding remarks To upgrade and provide secure rights on the extent of a property is certainly the duty of a government. In the coming era of e-government, spatial data infrastructure would necessarily be built on accurate property boundary layer, otherwise, cost and responsibilities cannot readily be estimated at the land parcel level, and developments are unnecessarily retarded. Opposite voices are always based on the huge cost of survey, which is untrue and there are successful cost-effective cadastral reform examples. We need a willing and able government to take the lead to break the inertia. It is difficult, so there are always rooms for improvement. Reference
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