The calamitous fire in the mid-night of 30 November 2011 at Fa Yuen Street hawker stalls rang the alarm to the whole Hong Kong society on the need to ensure public safety if we want to preserve the hawker stalls as part of our unique street culture beloved by Hong Kong people.
JCDISI lined up a multi-disciplinary team within PolyU to trigger a social innovation process started with extensive public participation, engaged the stakeholders with co-design workshops, supported by systematic scientific research and verified by robust testing of the proto-type.
The final design scheme was passed to the Government to kick-start the replacement of hawker stalls with public resources in all street markets of Hong Kong. As of February 2018, more than 90% of the local hawker stalls have been replaced using the proto-type design and produced by PolyU.