I Want To Be a Rich Man on Hong Kong Island

  Chapter 432【Revolution in Tsim Sha Tsui】

  In the mid-1960s, the way of freight transportation on Hong Kong Island was revolutionized, and the appearance of the coast of the Kowloon Peninsula began to change drastically.

  Before the 1960s, the coast of the Kowloon Peninsula was mainly piers, warehouses, and docks;

  At that time, the area around Tsim Sha Tsui was the old-style wharf warehouse of Wharf. Along the shore, between Tsim Sha Tsui and Tai Kok Tsui were numerous berths for supply ships and barges;

  Extending eastward from Tsim Sha Tsui along the coastline, it is the warehouse of the famous Blue Chimney Shipping Company;

  Continuing to extend eastward along the coastline is the huge Whampoa Dockyard (Hung Hom), which is far away from the Taikoo Dockyard in Quarry Bay on the island.

  The coast of these places is a variety of shops serving shipping, full of hemp rope, machinery and various ship supplies;

  In addition, there are bars, restaurants, and hotels exclusively used by watermen.

  However, after the mid-1960s, Hong Kong shipping entered the era of containerization;

  Container No. 123 of Kwai Chung of Universal Group, grabbing a lot of business;

  The original functions of Wharf and Blue Chimney have declined, and the business has been sluggish.

  In 1967, Cheung Kong Holdings took down the most beautiful blue chimney in Tsim Sha Tsui for only 75 million Hong Kong dollars.

  In early May 1968, Cheung Kong Industrial officially issued a notice that it would build a “New World Center” on the site of the Blue Chimney to invigorate the Hong Kong and Kowloon real estate industry.

  (PS: Zheng Yutong is a New World Development Company established in 1970, so New World Center will not have the same name.)

  The design blueprint of the New World Center, after 5 months, gathered the efforts of dozens of famous designers from all over the world, and finally it was freshly released in May.

  The architectural design of the entire New World Center is very different from Wu Guangyao’s first draft. Of course, Wu Guangyao also provided some of his own ideas;

  Wu Guangyao is not a professional designer and planner after all, and he did not consider it too carefully;

  If we follow Wu Guangyao’s original design, more than 30% of the land will be wasted. This is Li Xing’s original words;

  Wu Guangyao admitted his mistake at that time, wasting 30% of the land, wouldn’t it be a loss of tens of billions?

  Even if Wu Guangyao is rich in wealth, he has to be in pain.

Cheung Kong Industrial feels that although there are many commercial buildings and prosperous in the Central Business District, it becomes a street with sparse pedestrians after get off work in the evening; therefore, the design concept of Cheung Kong Industrial is to continue the design philosophy of the Yangtze River Center and build a high-end residential building. Shopping malls, office buildings, hotels, and recreation centers are integrated as a "small city state".

The construction plan for the entire New World Center is: 3 luxury residences, 3 high-end office buildings, an ultra-luxury sailing hotel, a three-storey shopping mall and comprehensive recreational facilities are planned to be built on the 500,000 square feet of land in East Tsim Sha Tsui. Facilities (amusement park).

  Because this lot is controlled by the Hong Kong Airport Ordinance, the height of the building cannot exceed 61 meters, so the site area and the height of the building are not symmetrical.

  In order to solve this appearance problem, the designers decided to divide the entire site of the blue chimney into three groups of buildings of different shapes;

  First of all, the Burj Al Arab Hotel is built on the west side of the Blue Chimney (on the side of the Hong Kong Arts Center), with an exclusive land of 150,000 square feet;

   Then, 3 high-end residential buildings, 3 Grade A office buildings, a total of 6 buildings; connected together by a huge 3-storey podium (shopping center).

  The 6 buildings are all 17 stories high and are located above the huge podium. Each building is independent and actually connected to each other;

  Moreover, the 6 buildings are divided into two groups of shapes, forming two letters, C and Z.

  First of all, the C-shaped building complex is composed of three Grade A office buildings. The three office buildings are all three small fan-shaped buildings, which just form a C-shaped building group. One point, the C letter is divided into three sections of buildings);

Secondly, the Z-shaped building group is composed of three high-level residential buildings. Two in-line high-level residential buildings and one diagonal high-level residential building form a Z-shaped building group (more popular, Z The three-segment building complex).

  Finally, from the overall effect, it is a sailboat shape, a C letter shape, and a Z letter shape, which together form the ‘New World Center’.

  When this rendering came out, everyone on Hong Kong Island cheered for him!

  Too pretty!

  In fact, there is an idea from Wu Guangyao: the sailing hotel symbolizes riding the wind and waves, the shape of the C letter symbolizes the initial letter of China in English, and the shape of the Z letter symbolizes the initial letter of Pinyin China.

  Wu Guangyao wanted to use this to express his patriotism towards the motherland.

  Unfortunately, how many people can understand themselves!

  I am afraid that the meaning of the New World Center will be buried for another twenty years.

  Considering that various costs will gradually increase during the construction process;

   Wu Guangyao estimated that the construction cost of the entire New World Center is estimated to be around 500 million Hong Kong dollars (without capping).

  You should know that the construction cost of the Yangtze River Center is only more than 70 million Hong Kong dollars;

  In fact, it is easy to understand that the cost of construction materials and labor will increase significantly in the past few years.

  At the same time as the construction cost increases, the real estate industry is naturally going up. After all, capitalists will never trade at a loss;

  As far as Wu Guangyao knows, the monthly rent for Grade A office buildings in Central this year is 1.24 Hong Kong dollars per square foot;

  But by the end of 1972, the monthly rent of Grade A office buildings in Central will reach 5 Hong Kong dollars per square foot;

  In five years, the rents of Grade A office buildings in Central have increased by 400%.

  The rent of the Yangtze River Center in 1968 is estimated to be 35 million Hong Kong dollars, but by 1972, the rent may reach 120 million Hong Kong dollars.

  It only takes one year to make all the costs back. What a high return!

  Of course, the construction of the Yangtze River Center began in the late 1950s, when the land and construction costs were much lower.

  Changjiang Industrial is constructing three major projects at the same time, namely, the Changhe Commercial Complex in Singapore, the four commercial buildings in Central (Grade A office buildings), and the New World Center;

  In terms of funds, there are successively about 300 million Hong Kong dollars in funds, which is obviously not enough;

  However, the expenditures for the three projects are, after all, successive expenditures, and there is no need for a one-time expenditure of close to 1 billion Hong Kong dollars.

  As for the follow-up expenses, Wu Guangyao has already thought about it, that is, issuing new shares and privately increasing shares (Wu family).

  The current stock price of Cheung Kong Holdings is 16 Hong Kong dollars per share, with a total market value of 770 million Hong Kong dollars, which is far lower than the actual value of Cheung Kong Holdings;

  Of course, there is also a situation here, that is, after the stock market plummeted last year, the stock price of Cheung Kong Holdings was the first blue chip stock to rebound;

  In August 1967, Cheung Kong's share price plummeted to 12 Hong Kong dollars per share. Before the Hong Kong Island real estate industry had begun to rebound, Cheung Kong's share price had risen to 16 Hong Kong dollars per share, an increase of 33%;

  It is conceivable that Wu Guangyao’s golden signboard is so shining!

  With the start of the construction of the New World Center, the stock price will rise sharply, and it is expected to rise to the highest level in history by the end of the year-28 Hong Kong dollars per share, with a total market value of 1.35 billion Hong Kong dollars;

  This is still Hong Kong Island’s stock market and real estate, which have not started to rise.

  Naturally, it is impossible for Cheung Kong to issue new shares at this time. After all, it will not be considered until 1969.

  Don’t worry about funds. Loan is a very good way. Everbright Bank brings it to Cheung Kong, like a left hand to a right hand.

  (End of this chapter)