S’pore’s age is showing in its latest draft masterplan – and that’s a good thing

SINGAPORE – Hanging in the atrium and pasted on the glass walls of The URA Centre in Maxwell Road are portraits of people – members of the public, activists, architects and others who call Singapore home.

Some of them were among nearly 220,000 people who took part in a months-long exercise to put together a new blueprint that will chart the country’s development for the next 10 to 15 years.

Unveiled by the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) on June 25, in Singapore’s 60th year of independence, the Draft Master Plan 2025 and its accompanying exhibition show Singapore’s age – and that is a good thing.

Initiatives under the blueprint demonstrate that Singapore is now old enough and eager to tell its story through its conservation programme or by other means of remembrance.

Telling Singapore’s story

While Singapore’s unlikely and rapid growth since independence has been well documented, the country’s post-independence buildings have been under-represented in the more than 7,200 buildings and structures conserved thus far.

At the launch of the draft masterplan exhibition, URA announced a thematic framework that will improve the way it assesses buildings’ significance, by considering how they contributed to Singapore’s history under at least one of four themes – economy, housing, social and defence.

On top of the architectural, historic, traditional and aesthetic lenses through which buildings are considered for conservation, the thematic framework broadens the scope used to assess buildings, and considers what they mean in Singapore’s story – and to Singaporeans.

The exhibition hints at the buildings and sites that the authorities have in mind.

URA cited Prima Flour Mill in Keppel Road, which started operations in 1963 as Singapore’s first flour mill, as well as Selegie House, also completed in 1963 as the country’s then tallest mixed-use development.

The hope is that as Singapore turns 60, this renewed emphasis on telling the nation’s story, as well as a more holistic heritage framework, will prevent another nationally loved building – like the old National Library – from being lost to redevelopment.

Time for details

With decades of work shaping the city-state and Singaporeans’ basic needs largely met, the planners of today are looking beyond just quantity – the need to rapidly establish new towns – and focusing on improving the quality and variety of existing living environments.

By 2030, one in four Singaporeans will be 65 or older.

As the population greys, talk surrounding new homes is now not just about whether they are public or private, but also whether they are senior-friendly, with more assisted living options and senior activity centres in the pipeline.

In the recreational realm, the authorities have in recent years also focused more on quality.

In the last decade, large, airy “community living rooms” have become a feature of new and refurbished malls, giving patrons a comfortable space in which to chill out and chat, read a book, or sip a coffee.

Called Privately-Owned Public Spaces, or Pops, more than 30 of these spaces have sprung up, thanks to guidelines that URA rolled out in 2017.

The provision of Pops shows the detail that goes into planning – not just providing malls, but using policy levers to nudge developers towards providing meaningful and accessible public spaces.

While areas where basic infrastructure is already in place may be easy to overlook, planners have continued making improvements.

Upcoming efforts to upgrade the walking and cycling paths in three identity corridors – elongated stretches with identities and characters that the authorities aim to strengthen – are a case in point.

A stretch of Zion Road between Ganges Avenue and River Valley Road will be repurposed to accommodate wider walking and cycling paths.

And along a stretch of Kallang River next to St Andrew’s Junior College where there already is a park connector, more public spaces and cycling paths are being planned for visitors and students to enjoy the waterfront.

These plans show that planners are not just focused on creating new estates, but are continuously finding ways to improve the living environment for residents.

Be that as it may, the provision of more homes remains a key priority.

The upcoming redevelopment of Sembawang Shipyard, Kranji Racecourse and Paya Lebar Air Base shows that future development needs are still front and centre, while as-yet-undeveloped land plots slated for housing remain in areas such as Tagore and Clementi Road.

Users as experts

In many aspects of the draft masterplan, public feedback was sought.

Improvements to existing areas, such as upgrades to walking and cycling infrastructure along the identity corridors, were proposed after engagements with 2,300 residents and users.

Draft Master Plan 2025 marked the most extensive engagement exercise URA has conducted so far, with nearly 220,000 people engaged.

It trumps the more than 15,000 engaged for the Long-Term Plan between 2021 and 2022 – during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The Long-Term Plan, which informs the draft masterplan, charts the country’s needs for the next 50 years and beyond.

All this shows that when it comes to urban planning, regular users of spaces are the experts.

URA’s engagement efforts are in line with broader global trends in urban planning, which has become much less top-down or expert-led, and where citizens have a stake.

To ensure Singaporeans were heard, multiple exhibitions and roadshows were organised for the draft masterplan from October 2023, which almost 186,000 people visited.

More than 26,000 people participated in focus-group discussions, workshops and other conversations. About 7,000 people responded to public surveys.

Some members of the public even

joined planners in kayaks and paddled down Kallang River

, as part of efforts to generate ideas on how to improve an identity corridor there.

Such interactions build trust and understanding between those with differing needs and interests, and between the public and planners.

The latest land-use plans show that public feedback does make a difference.

In response to suggestions from a focus-group discussion for the Katong-Joo Chiat area, where participants requested more shaded public spaces and seating, URA is planning a new pedestrian mall in East Coast Road, between i12 Katong shopping centre and Katong V mall.

Engaging widely for Draft Master Plan 2025 is a step in the right direction, and it would augur well for URA to keep up this scale of outreach efforts for future reviews of the masterplan.

Only then can land-use plans closely mirror the needs of the public.

A long-term endeavour

While a refreshed blueprint is put out roughly once every five years, planning is an ongoing endeavour, with old plans revived and new ones in the works for years.

Upcoming developments under the draft masterplan – such as turning Bishan into a business hub and the rejuvenation of Istana Park and its surrounds – were already announced in 2019, following the previous review of the masterplan.

Reaching further back, plans to build new homes in Pearl’s Hill were announced in June 2003.

Yet much of the land there that has been zoned for residential use has not had new homes built on it for the past two decades.

After works on the Thomson-East Coast Line were completed in the area, these plans were

presented again in November 2023

, when the authorities said 6,000 new public and private homes will be built.

Notably, a plan revealed in 1991 to reclaim a “Long Island” off East Coast Park has in recent years been revived as a coastal protection solution, in addition to meeting other needs.

It may be hard to reconcile Singapore’s pace of rapid urban change with the protracted, continuous nature of longer-term urban planning.

Yet, as the Draft Master Plan 2025 has shown, Singapore can make development decisions that honour its past and reflect the needs of its citizens, while remaining open to change.