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Maybe a few more rules for parks

By Hong Liang (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-06-09 07:54

In the concrete jungle of Hong Kong, we love our parks.

The emotional attachment we have to every precious patch of grass seems excessive and unfathomable to people from other cities, where wide stretches of rural land is only a few hours away by car.

In Hong Kong, the urban sprawl has displaced what used to be paddy fields and fish farms. The rural townships along the railway line from Hunghom in the city to Lowu at the border with Shenzhen have long been incorporated into the urban district with tall buildings housing hundreds of thousands of families.

The only relief we can find in the confines of the oppressive cityscape are the few public parks. Despite their modest scale and limited facilities, we treasure them as much as the backyard that we can't hope to have.

For that reason, the government proposal to review the management and use of the parks has generated great interest and concern among our fellow citizens.

A prominent politician recently wrote in the South China Morning Post expressing dissatisfaction at the many rules that have restricted our enjoyment of the park facilities. He seemed particularly galled by the fact that children are not allowed to roam free on the grass lawn.

He also sympathized with a friend who complained that his siesta was interrupted by a park warden reminding him that it was against the rule to lie on the benches.

In his essay, our politician calls for revising the long established rules to allow greater freedom in the use of the parks. In some Australian cities, he pointed out, there are signs urging visitors to step on the grass. In contrast, our parks are dotted with "keep off the grass" signs.

Grass is precious in Hong Kong. When I was a kid at school, I was caught once taking a short cut across the lawn in the garden marked "out-of-bounds" for students.

Instead of sending me to the dreaded detention class, the kind prefect gave me a lesson on horticulture, explaining that the grass on the lawn didn't grow naturally in Hong Kong because of the poor top soil.

Indeed, any landscape expert in Hong Kong can tell you that maintaining a lawn is a laborious task. For that reason, there is a real need for those "no trespassing" signs to keep people out of the lawns in our parks.

Hong Kong, as we all know, is a very crowded place. Land is always at a premium. To share the highly limited facilities we built for public use, we must observe a myriad rules that may seem overly restrictive to some people.

For example, the heavy fine for littering seemed excessive when it was introduced some years ago. But nobody seems to be complaining now because it has helped make Hong Kong a much cleaner place than it was before.

It is commendable for the government to initiate a review of the management of our parks. In doing so, it must bear in mind that the parks in the inner city are symbols of the quality of life expected by the public. They are also a showcase of the quality of the people of Hong Kong.

The government has done a credible job in keeping our public parks clean and pleasant. Those rules are there to help them in this challenging task. I don't think they are overly restrictive.

In fact, I can think of a few more to keep our parks in pristine shape.

E-mail: jamesleung@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 06/09/2009 page8)