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Survey′s the impact of the Mass Transit Railway (MTR) on office rental structures and locations in Hong Kong. Follows up earlier work by Gareth Williams on Mass Rapid Transport (MRT). Reports that the results falsify the commonsense theory that improvement in accessibility would reduce the relative primacy of the Central Business Districts (CBD) as an office centre. Concludes that attempts by strategic planners to implant high‐grade offices in off‐CBD locations along the MTR line need serious reconsideration.

Investigates the evolution of mass rapid transit (MRT) in relation to the Hong Kong market and analyses the effect of surrounding land values. Outlines the unique features of Hong Kong which make an urban railway system ideal and discusses the changes brought about by MRT. Summarizes the growth of commercial development on Hong Kong island and gives case studies on the Admiralty, Sheung Wan and Taikooshing/Kornhill areas in respect of their development with the advent of MRT. Notes that the shortening of travelling time for workers has increased demand for, and hence the price of, sites immediately adjacent to MRT stations.

The use of telecare with appropriate domiciliary care packages may provide the means to manage many of the risks associated with the increasing number of older people who wish to continue to live independently in their own homes. Those who become especially frail or disabled can retain their independence and quality of life if their homes are made ‘smart’. This paper discusses the range of services that are available, or under development, for the prototype ‘MIDAS’ (Modular Intelligent Domiciliary Alarm System) telecare system, which enable traditional community alarm, telecare and assistive technologies to be used in an integrated and intelligent fashion. A range of services that allow autonomous operation within the home (and hence increase the perceived independence of a client by decreasing the reliance on a response centre operator) known as ‘HAMISH’ may be used. It offers a wider range of cost‐effective services of relevance to both the individual, and to society, in different types of home environment including dispersed housing and new sheltered housing schemes.

Telecare is a new form of assistive technology that has the potential to offer benefits to a wide range of stakeholders including the service user, informal carers and formal care services. It is a complex intervention, combining selected items of technology and telecommunications equipment in combination with conventional community services in order to support independent living. An overview of a robust evaluation framework is presented that will enable services to be compared from several viewpoints. It also offers a means of considering individual service elements and their integration into an effective service delivering cost benefits to the health and social care economies as well as improved quality of life to service users.

Telecare services are now available across the UK but few have the technical expertise necessary to prescribe and provide the bespoke solutions that may be required to support more complex cases. This paper describes a range of innovative approaches to extending the application of existing telecare systems to cater for the needs of people facing different physical or cognitive challenges. They include new, easy‐to‐operate alarm switches, interfaces for bed/chair occupancy and property exit alarms, and a range of hybrid arrangements that can result in automatic alarms for the management of various environmental emergencies. Examples are provided for hypothermia, hyperthermia, poor air quality and noise alarms.

Key‐safes have become a backbone of community care, enabling formal carers to access the homes of people receiving routine homecare services or emergency services such as telecare. People need to have confidence in their security features if they are to wholeheartedly accept the need for keeping a key available in a safe at all times. A project was undertaken to compare the features of a number of popular key‐safes on the market in the UK, considering security as the most important factor but also including the subjective opinions of a panel of relevant stakeholders on issues such as aesthetics, value for money and usability. It was found that the newest device on the market, the Supra C500, was significantly more secure than its rivals, and was the only model in our trial to satisfy domestic security standards for front doors. It is proposed that all key‐safes should be required to achieve a national standard for resistance to forced entry before they can be considered for use as part of a homecare or telecare package in the UK.

THE ABOVE advertisement appeared in The Cambrian of 20th August 1875, and in the two following editions of this weekly newspaper. Swansea had adopted the Public Libraries Acts at a lively and rather stormy meeting in October 1870. Until December 1874, the matter of establishing a library service lay in abeyance. Then after mounting criticism, particularly in the local press, over the long delay in implementation of the Acts, the Town Council appointed a Library Committee which held its initial meeting on 8 January 1875. Their first important duty was to appoint a librarian.

Design for manufacture (DFM) is accepted as an important tool to improve manufacturing competitiveness. Reports on the results of the first phase of a study conducted by Cranfield University to establish the user requirements for “design for manufacture” within a complex design and manufacture supply chain.

This paper is aimed at telecare service providers and individuals who are aiming to manage the risks to a vulnerable person, who may be prone to becoming lost away from their own home. It aims to help them identify the issues that may be relevant in specifying the most appropriate GPS location device from the many models now on the market.

The reported study is based on a comparison of six commercial devices with three different form characteristics. Technical measures of performance were undertaken in an objective manner for each device. These were considered along with the subjective views of a panel of stake‐holders looking at issues such as usability, wearability and aesthetics in determining value for money and the optimum device for individual users.

The work concluded that battery management was of vital importance, and that the use of geo‐fencing for alarm purposes was often limited by the minimum practical size of the fence and by the way that it could be established.

It is recommended that service providers employ a range of GPS devices within their inventories, so that they are not limited to one or two different devices when prescribing telecare services to people who are at risk of wandering, especially at night. The variation in cost between the most expensive and the cheapest can be justified in terms of service support and other options. These devices are most likely to be of benefit when used within a telecare service that can offer 24‐hour monitoring and links to a dedicated emergency response team.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce an end-to-end process to improve the prescription, uptake and utilisation of assisted living technologies in order to improve outcomes for older and disabled people.

The approach involved consideration of the ways in which people’s support needs are considered and how a more relevant picture can be drawn using their own goals and the issues and obstacles that prevent them achieving improvement. New models of support were introduced in order to improve the suitability of prescriptions for people who lived under different circumstances, sometimes with family carers.

It was found that the application of an enhanced assessment approach required professionals and family members to understand more about the range of available technologies and their limitations. In order to avoid rejection of the technology, there will be a need for service providers to extend the range of applications that they offer, and to consider the suitability of the home environment for introducing new systems.

The new model of assessment and prescription will improve the options for independent living for many people with minor disabilities and age-related problems.

The correct use of assistive technologies will be improved leading to users having more confidence in the use of technologies to support independence in place of conventional and expensive care services.

The new model of assessment and prescription described in this paper is novel and developed by the authors as original work. Its value is that it disrupts current assessment schemes and will encourage innovation in prescription, and a more person-centred approach to satisfying the needs of vulnerable people.