Photo Feature
Old-style market forced to give way to new complex
Photos and text by Bebe Leung and Hedy Wong
Half of the stallholders in Wan Chai・s Tai Yuen Street market are being forced to close their decades of business by the end of this year for the sake of a new residential project in the vicinity.
Those 86 vendors affected are given a few compensation options for the clearance. They can choose to surrender their licences for a one-off compensation, move indoors in the new residential complex, Zenith, or compete in a draw for the limited number of stalls in Jardine・s Crescent in Causeway Bay or Wun Sha Street in Tai Hang.
：They (the government) just want to clear the street up and increase the price of the new residential complex,； said Choi Tang Yuet-ho, convener of the Concern Group for Hawkers・ Rights in Wan Chai・s Cross Street and Tai Yuen Street .
Dubbed ： Toy Street ； in the district, Tai Yuen Street runs from north to south between Johnston Road and Queen・s Road East. It is one of the few streets that maintains the flavour of old Hong Kong . The stalls there sell a variety of items. Some of them have been doing business for more than 50 years.
The Food and Environmental Hygiene Department (FEHD) said the clearance was ：to avoid serious traffic jam after the completion of the new residential complex development；. The complex is a joint project of the Urban Renewal Authority and private developer Chinese Estates Holdings.
But the clearance order has met strong opposition from the vendors. While the authorities later made a consession by agreeing to remove only the southern part of Tai Yuen Street market and the eastern part of the nearby Cross Street market, the stallholders remain dissatisfied.
Choi said she did not see how their stalls would affect the traffic. ：Will all the cars rush out at the same time? The car park in the nearby C.C. Wu Building has co-existed with us for years, and I have never seen any serious traffic accidents,； the 56-year-old vendor said.
Since Tai Yuen Street is a prohibited zone for all cars between 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. daily, vehicles can gain access to the new residential block from Queen・s Road East where there are no stalls, she added.
Choi・s family has been running a stall for decades. Her parents opened their stall on Wan Chai Road 60 years ago. The family was later forced to move to Cross Street to give way to a new bus line. In 1991, the then Land Development Corporation relocated Choi・s stall to Tai Yuen Street because of another redevelopment project.
Stallholders hang a protest banner to show their
dissatisfaction with the clearance.
