Planning ahead: Permanent Secretary for Planning & Lands Carrie Lam outlines details of the third stage of the HK2030 public consultation.

Here is your chance to help shape Hong Kong's future.

Views are now being invited under stage three of the public consultation on HK2030: Planning Vision & Strategy.

Secretary for Housing, Planning & Lands Michael Suen said the Planning Department study aimed to create a framework for Hong Kong's physical development from now to year 2030. He called on the community to express views on the ideas put forward.

The ideas presented in the consultation booklet are only concepts.

The consultation highlights three main planning directions to help Hong Kong maintain its status as Asia's world city. They are providing a quality living environment, enhancing economic competitiveness, and strengthening links with the Mainland.

The study has worked out some planning choices set out in the stage three consultation. They concern the optimal density of development, where new housing will be based, space for offices, and where to locate our new port and other major infrastructural facilities. The options are in turn presented as two broad development patterns - consolidation and decentralisation.

For the consolidation pattern, it assumes existing urban sites will continue to be developed and made full use of before new areas are developed for medium and long-term needs.

The decentralisation pattern envisages the earlier need for new development areas in the New Territories.

"Planning invariably involves the making of choices. Our task is to present each of these choices and other relevant considerations so as to balance its costs and benefits for the community to consider," Mr Suen said, adding that the same principle applies to the harbour reclamation.

"Similarly, the community as a whole has to reach a consensus on how to strike a balance between satisfying essential infrastructure needs and protecting the harbour."

A roving exhibition on the HK2030 Study will be held from December 1. There will also be a series of public forums, focus group meetings and District Council presentations.

The booklet is available at District Offices and can be viewed on the HK2030 website www.info.gov.hk/hk2030.

The consultation will last for four months, ending in March.