Lawmakers on Wednesday welcomed the government's plan to develop a university town, including Hong Kong's third medical school, in San Tin in Yuen Long.

As part of the Northern Metropolis development project, authorities plan to use more than one-third of a 127-hectare land in Ngau Tam Mei to build an academic town, to bolster the SAR's status as an international education hub.

The so-called UniTown will house a medical school, where a new hospital will be built next to it.

Medical sector lawmaker David Lam said he expects the new facilities to offer advanced medical services to the residents there.

"If we want to develop the region, Northern Metropolis, into a big area with high-end research and a population, they would certainly expect to have good hospitals and state-of-the-art medical services," he told RTHK.

"With a university hospital in the region, you would expect this university hospital to provide state-of-the-art medical services to the people in the region."

Lam believes the new hospital, along with the existing Pok Oi and North District hospitals, will be able to cope with an expected increase in the region's population.

DAB lawmaker Edward Lau said the Ngau Tam Mei development plan, which he described as "reasonable", will offer crucial infrastructure to the nearby San Tin Technopole.

But he also pointed out that the development of some nearby areas, such as Au Tau located to the south of Ngau Tam Mei, has been lagging behind.

Lau called on the government to present plans to develop Au Tau and North Kam Tin as soon as possible.