Hong Kong plans to create car-free zones in parts of its central business district to improve the city’s air quality. Just this week, high pollution levels prompted government officials to urge people with respiratory and heart problems to stay indoors. Late last year, the city legislature more than doubled the penalty placed on dirty cars to $128. Elsewhere on the Hong Kong enviro radar, the city’s high court sided with the government and ruled yesterday that a 145-acre valley that is home to more than 70 species of dragonflies should be kept off-limits to development.
