by Dr Steven Choo
Senior Vice President
Research and Direct Investments
CapitaLand Limited

Long before remaking Singapore became a catch phrase, a different sort of remaking has been going on for decades. Urban renewal, or urban redevelopment, as it came to be known with the establishment of the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) in 1974, has been changing the physical fabric of our city-state on an unprecedented scale.

Today, many major buildings in the CBD and all over the island, from office buildings to hotels to shopping centres, display the ubiquitous plaque that says "URA Sale Site". And still more billboards and hoardings proclaim the successful sale of site and impending arrival of yet another New Downtown project or suburban condominium.

In all, under the Government Land Sales (GLS) programme, some 1,360 land parcels totaling 820 hectares had been sold for private sector development. These have provided 1.9 million sq m nett of office space, 1.3 million sq m nett of shop space, 12,000 hotel rooms and 51,700 private housing units, making up 31 percent, 41 percent, 39 percent and 26 percent of the total stock of the respective type of properties in Singapore.