page_title: Shek Kip Mei Estate
section_title: Conservation
hierarchical_section_title: Shek Kip Mei Estate / Conservation
caption_attribution_description: 中文（繁體）‎: 石硤尾邨美荷樓
context_page_description: Shek Kip Mei Estate is the first public housing estate in Hong Kong. It is located in Sham Shui Po and is under the management of the Hong Kong Housing Authority. The estate was constructed as a result of a fire in Shek Kip Mei in 1953, to settle the families of inhabitants in the squats over the hill who lost their homes in one night.
  Originally constructed in 1953 to alleviate the immediate housing need, the units in this "Mark I" estate were utilitarian. Redevelopment of the estate commenced in 1972, with new towers coming on stream between 1979 and 1982. Site 1 of redevelopment was occupied in 2007.
  The estate now consists of 17 housing blocks, containing 9200 units/flats of between 11.1 and 55.7 square metres in floor area. The estate has an authorised capacity of 13,900.
context_section_description: Block 41 of the estate, Mei Ho House (美荷樓), the last remaining example of the "Mark II" building in a single-block configuration, has been listed as a Grade I historic building, and will be preserved tentatively as a record of Hong Kong's public housing development. In 2008, it was part of the seven buildings of Batch I of the Hong Kong Government's Revitalising Historic Buildings Through Partnership Scheme seeking adaptive reuse of government-owned historic buildings. On 17 February 2009, the government declared that the building would be used by the Hong Kong Youth Hostels Association as "City Hostel". The capital cost of the project was estimated at HK$192.3 million. Estimated completion time was early 2012. The hostel was finally opened in December 2013.
  It was closed due to the covid-19 epidemic.*
caption: Mei Ho House, of Shek Kip Mei Estate near Tai Po Road, in 2013, after its renovation and conversion into a youth hostel.
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