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Hong Kong is brimming with neon-lit shopping strips that sell luxury brands, jewels, and technology to eager consumers; the skyscraper-filled skyline contains businesses that make the city one of the world’s major financial hubs. Yet behind the glamorous facade, approximately 200,000 people, including 40,000 children, live in spaces ranging in size from around 15 – 100 square feet.
With a population of nearly 7.5 million and almost no developable land remaining, Hong Kong’s housing market has risen to the most expensive in the world. Pushed out by soaring rents, tens of thousands of people have no other option than to inhabit squatter huts, sub-divided units where the kitchen and toilet merge, coffin cubicles, and cage homes, which are rooms measuring as small as 6’ x 2.5’ traditionally made of wire mesh. “From cooking to sleeping, all activities take place in these tiny spaces,” says Lam. To create the coffin cubicles a 400 square flat will be illegally divided by its owner to accommodate 20 double-decker beds, each costing about HK$2000 (over $250 USD) per month in rent. The space is too small to stand up in.
Better than being homeless, but only just.
(Score: 2) by fritsd on Sunday July 30 2017, @08:56AM (2 children)
not everybody enjoys sleeping on a bed made of concrete, steel, and glass.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @05:10PM (1 child)
Normal beds are fine.
In a proper building, a bed can completely burn without causing fire to spread throughout the building. There is no risk of structural failure. There is no need to actively suppress the fire, because it will stop when it runs out of fuel.
The only potential issue is smoke inhalation. Poor ventilation design allows the smoke to obstruct hallways and stairwells, and to get into other living units. Good ventilation design avoids that, so that people in other parts of the building need not be bothered.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 01 2017, @01:54AM
So no carpeting allowed, no painting allowed, no gas supply, etc... Good luck trying to upgrade your in-wall cabling.
Two kids in a room sleeping in separate beds. A night light catches one bed on fire. A sprinkler would save the second kid (and possibly the first depending on the layout). Without one both kids burn to death.