Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Posts Tagged ‘Housing Development Board’

One of the more unusual things I did on this trip was to visit the HDB (Housing Development Board) Hub. I hoped to learn something about how Singapore has pretty much solved its housing problems. In the event I didn’t quite manage that, but it was interesting in a number of ways.

First, though, a bit of a recap. When Singapore became fully independent in 1965, it was not the place it is now. While it wasn’t exactly ‘3rd World’ it definitely wasn’t 1st world. It was a place of contrasts. On the one hand there was former colonial housing (think tropical bungalows) and modern businesses, and on the other hand there were traditional Asian enterprises: shophouses and waterfront go-downs on the one hand, and a number of traditional Malay villages or Kampongs. These were all badly over-crowded, had poor or non-existent sanitation, no connection to other central services – you can imagine the picture. Today these have all gone, apart from those shophouses and occasional Kampong house that have been preserved and re-purposed, and the population mainly lives in high-rise apartment complexes. Some of these are privately-built, but the great majority of the complexes, housing about 80% of the population, are provided by the HDB. And they work! – they are clean; they are well-maintained; there is no crime (actually, that’s true of Singapore generally); and there’s some strange way in which although these apartments are publicly provided, they are in fact individually owned. (more…)

Read Full Post »