Forum: Forget new park for Pek Kio, build up current one instead

In Pek Kio, there lies a temporary exercise park which also serves as a green lung for the neighbourhood.

It is filled with 30-year-old trees, is home to wildlife such as hornbills, and allows residents to exercise with its 3.6km circular track and elder-centric exercising equipment, hence promoting interaction and community bonding objectives.

However, the temporary exercise park remains zoned as a residential plot of land, indicating that it is slated for future private developments. A check with the Urban Redevelopment Authority masterplan shows that a new community park which is 60 per cent smaller and in a different location has been allocated for the use of Pek Kio residents.

Removing the temporary park in favour of a significantly smaller exercise park in a different location will threaten the habitat of wildlife and reduce the size of Pek Kio's carbon basin, and is detrimental to community bonding through exercise as the smaller space will simply be too tight for group activities.

Despite e-mails and a proposal submitted to Members of Parliament to convert the park, which has been granted special temporary use for recreation, into a permanent exercise park and to maximise its use by introducing urban farming to further community activities, communication has been sparse.

Ironically, efforts are instead focused on developing the proposed community park, such as creating an urban farming corridor or holding competitions to generate ideas for green sculpture designs.

Much effort and resources are being wasted on trying to build a new green space when these could have been used to improve the current park.

This space for the public, and a valuable green lung, will be lost for good in an era where sustainability, the green movement and forging the kampung spirit have never been more important.

Claire Tham

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