From Urbanphoto.net an article celebrating Hong Kong's shophouses and the people who promote their preservation: "What complicates matters is that few individual shophouses are worthy of being considered historic monuments, says Lee [Ho-yin, the director of the University of Hong Kong’s architectural conservation program], who calls them 'the speculative buildings of their time,' not altogether different in purpose from the glossy apartment towers being built today. Many of the worst-preserved shophouses are located where redevelopment pressure is intense and owners can expect a big payout if they sell their building to developers. 'We’re so used to the kind of large-scale development done by big developers or the URA that we take it for granted that this is the only way to do things,' [Lee Ho-yin] says. 'One reason Hong Kong is so weak at historic conservation is the lack of diversity in our land development system.'" Full article here. The article mentions a Flickr photo pool of Hong Kong Shophouses.