The Centennial Campus project is by far the largest development project in the history of HKU. Another record-breaking project is also in the pipeline – the greening of the whole campus. In this issue, Iris Hoi, Director of Urbis Ltd., the project’s landscape consultant will tell us how this compact campus will be transformed into an oasis of the district.

“When we were given the task of planting nearly 500 new trees across the whole campus, the first question that came to mind was: where? The existing Main Campus is already quite crowded and are we going to plant trees on the roads?” recalled Iris.

“Fortunately the architect of the Centennial Campus has proposed creating many merged indoor/outdoor areas and we will be able to plant trees right to the ‘interior’, such as the Academic Courtyards. More importantly, the rooftop of the new service reservoirs will become a landscaped area. This 4000 m² of space will become the ‘oasis’ of the Western District.” added Iris.

According to the Landscape Master Plan developed by Urbis, more than 150 trees will be planted on this rooftop garden. The structure of the service reservoirs has been reinforced to accommodate the deeper soil needed for the planting of trees. The soil will be as deep as 1.8 to 2 m and the whole planting area will be one large continuous planter so that trees can grow big and strong in the future.

The garden will feature a central lawn of about 1,900 m², which is around four times as large as the Sun Yat-sen Place, or ‘Happy Square’. There will be footpaths leading to the Lung Fu Shan Country Park. Other features include jogging tracks, sculptures and the “bricks wall” honouring our donors’ support.

“We are going to plant trees in the Main Campus as well, such as along the Sun Yat-sen Steps, in the little courtyard between the Run Run Shaw Building and the James Hsiong Lee Science Building, and along the future University Street. We are also planning one or two signature trees in the Centennial Campus, likely to be near the new entrance and at one of the Academic Courtyards.” said Iris.

The construction of the new campus will affect some existing trees in the area. Protection of the environment is one of the key principles of our campus development and trees will be retained as far as possible. Those which have to be removed will either be transplanted or felled. “A total of 168 trees will need to be felled. None of them are species of high ecological value. They are not suitable for transplantation for a number of reasons. They may be in poor health and form, at slopes greater than 40 degrees, or with low survival rate after transplant.” she remarked.

The species of the 500 new trees will be selected based on a number of considerations. The species should contribute to the ecological values of the nearby Lung Fu Shan area, and provide a comfortable environment for the users. On the road to a green campus, this landscaping strategy will create a network of trees which will unify both the Main Campus and the new campus.      

Are Tree Removal Works Regulated?

All tree removal works of this project require the approval of the District Lands Office. A Tree Removal Application was prepared and prior to its submission, the whole landscape proposal was presented to the Central and Western District Council in May and June 2008. No adverse comments were received and the application was approved in March 2009.