News Releases

7 August 2008

Award of tender for hotel site at Balestier Road

The Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) has awarded the tender for the hotel site at Balestier Road to HH Properties Pte. Ltd. The company has submitted the highest bid in the tender for the site. Tender for the site closed on 16 July 2008 and a total of three tenders were received. The particulars of the awarded Land Parcel and the successful tenderer are:

1 See Annexes A-1 and A-2 for the location of the Land Parcel.

The hotel site at Balestier Road was launched for tender on 31 March 2008 as part of URA’s planning initiatives to facilitate a unique integrated hotel and park development to kick-start the rejuvenation plans of the Balestier area. With a sizable gross floor area of about 40,000 sqm, the future development will be a landmark development in the area that will establish a strong connection with the heritage Sun Yat Sen Nanyang Memorial Hall, a national monument.

Balestier Road- Rich in History, Characterised by a Vibrant Mix of Uses

Balestier Road is one of the historical commercial streets in Singapore. It is located in close proximity to the commercial, retail and medical hubs at Novena and Orchard Road, Singapore’s premier shopping street. The Central Business District at Raffles Place and Marina Bay is also a short 15-minute drive away. The area is rich in history and home to an interesting mix of conserved shophouses that were built in the 1840s and monuments such as the Sun Yat Sen Nanyang Memorial Hall which is a national monument that pays tribute to Dr Sun Yat Sen. In recognition of its strong heritage value and distinctive old world charm, Balestier has been designated as one of Singapore’s Identity Nodes since 2002.

Since the release of the Identity Plan, URA has studied the Balestier area and gazetted many conservation buildings in the area as part of the Old World Charm conservation proposals. Today, about 150 shophouses have been gazetted for conservation.

The juxtaposition of the heritage shophouses and new buildings creates an interesting streetscape along Balestier Road. Many locals and tourists explore Balestier Road to immerse themselves in its historical charms and dine in the many interesting eating outlets.

Transforming from Plans to Reality – Realisation of a Unique Hotel Development

Located along Balestier Road, the hotel site comprises a contiguous street block of 1.77 ha. URA sees that there is opportunity for the developments within the hotel sale site to serve as a catalyst for the rejuvenation and transformation of Balestier area.

With the successful sale of the site, the proposed development is envisaged to be a distinctive contemporary hotel that integrates seamlessly with the Zhongshan Park and synergises with the Sun Yat Sen Nanyang Memorial Hall and the surrounding heritage shophouses. This will add to the vibrancy and enhance the environmental quality of the greater Balestier area (see artist’s impression in Annexes A-3 and A-4).

A public event space will also be provided within the northern corner of the Zhongshan Park. This event space will form part of the pedestrian network for the area and serve as a gathering place for the staging of events and activities that will activate and enhance the vibrancy of the park. To further enhance the visitor’s experience to area, URA is also currently working with various agencies to improve the walkways and landscaping along the Balestier Road.

This unique integrated hotel-park development will also add character and variety to the hotel mix in Singapore which is part of government’s tourism effort of enhancing visitors’ experience. Given the strong cultural and historical significance, visitors interested in discovering more about Singapore's cultural heritage may visit the Sun Yat Sen Nanyang Memorial Hall, Zhongshan Park and stay at the Balestier Road hotel nearby to complement their cultural experience. By 2015, Singapore expects to welcome 17 million visitors and there is a need to have more rooms and also a sufficient range of accommodation options to cater to different market segments. The proposed hotel site estimated to yield about 500 to 600 hotel rooms will therefore add significant supply to Singapore's range of Mid-Tier hotels.

A Design Advisory Panel will be set up to work with the successful tenderer and their appointed architects to identify design opportunities and guide the successful tenderer in the detailed design of the proposed development so that it achieves the desired planning outcome and enhance the overall development and urban surroundings at Balestier Road. In the past, the successful collaboration between similar design panels and appointed architects have resulted in many quality developments in the city, such as Ion Orchard, Orchard Central, Somerset Central, One Fullerton and One Raffles Link.