Remaking Singapore's heartland: sustaining public housing through home and neighbourhood upgrade programmes

Abstract

Singapore's public housing system is regarded as a model of modernisation and efficiency. By 1990, over 80% of the country's citizens lived in towns and estates created by the Housing Development Board (HDB) to overcome problems of land scarcity and poor planning. The HDB faces ongoing challenges to ensure the social, economic, and environmental sustainability of the ageing public housing supply in new towns. This paper describes three programmes designed to sustain public housing in Singapore since 1990. The Main Upgrading Program, Neighborhood Renewal Program (NRP), and Remaking our Heartland programmes intend to ensure the viability of Singapore's public housing and offer a template for other maturing housing systems. After reviewing the programmes, we provide case examples where neighbourhood upgrading has occurred. Whereas Singapore's specific policy environment makes wholesale transfer of these programmes difficult, certain strategic and tactical elements of the urban renewal programmes can provide tools for other housing authorities to adopt.

Keywords:

• Singapore
• policy review
• public housing
• property development
• housing and development board

Acknowledgments

This paper was funded by a Hewlett International Research grant through the University of Pittsburgh's University Center for International Studies, and by Faculty Research Grants through the Global Studies Center and Asian Studies Center. The authors acknowledge Singapore's Ministry of National Development and Housing Development Board for their cooperation with this review. We also thank KC Ho, Tan Ern Ser, Sock-Yong Phang, and Donald Low for their support and assistance. Any omissions or errors remain the sole responsibility of the authors.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. SG$3000 in 2001 equates to USD$1731 (in 2001 dollars).