EU COURT (Conservation)

Dr Tan Cheng Bock asked the Minister for National Development whether Eu Court along Stamford Road is to be conserved and, if not, why was one million dollars spent to repair and paint a building when it is to be demolished after one year's use.

Mr Dhanabalan: Mr Speaker, Sir, Eu Court will be demolished to make way for the new two-way Part VIII and Part VII lane carriageway road system starting from Neil Road to Kallang River. This system involves the widening of New Bridge Road, Hill Street, Victoria Street and Kallang Road. The scheme has already been completed from Neil Road to Coleman Street and from Lavender Street to Kallang River. Other sections are presently under construction. In the construction programme, the widening of the Hill Street section is expected to be finished some time in 1992.

The decision to renovate Eu Court was taken in March 1988 when it was known that the widening of Hill Street section would be delayed by 4-5 years because of certain land acquisition problems. Minor renovations costing about $920,000 were carried out to prevent the building from deteriorating further and becoming a fire hazard. The intention was to rent out the building in the interim period before the building was required to be demolished for road widening. It was estimated, at the time that the decision was taken to renovate the building, that the building could be rented for about 2-3 years which was more than enough to recover the cost of renovation.

Under the plan to renovate Eu Court, the building was expected to be renovated and leased out by June 1989, thus giving two and a half years of rental income before demolition of the building at the end of 1991. Renovation started according to schedule but was held up because there were still some old tenants in Eu Court who could not be resettled according to the programme. Renovation was only completed in July 1990 and the building was rented out in December 1990.

Although the present plans on the road widening will require the building to be demolished in early 1992, there is a great likelihood that the building could be rented out until mid-1992 before it is cleared for demolition. The present net rental of the building is $500,000 a year. At this rental, we should be able to recover about 80% of the cost of renovation before the building is demolished. It is regrettable that not all the costs of renovation can be recovered. On hindsight, URA's schedule for renovation and lease did not provide a sufficient margin for slippage in the execution of the programme. If there is any similar interim-use project in the future, more care will be taken to ensure that all contingencies are taken into account.

In summary, when the decision to renovate was taken in 1988, the study on economic viability clearly showed that the cost of renovation would be recovered well before the building was required to be demolished. But problems in implementation shortened the period that the building could be rented out.

Dr Tan Cheng Bock (Ayer Rajah): Sir, do I take it from the Minister that between February 1984 when Eu Court was acquired and September 1990 when it was upgraded at a cost of $1 million, ie, a period of six years, the Ministry of National Development did not consider conserving Eu Court, like the way they have conserved Stamford House? Can I take it that the Ministry was looking at the issue purely from the transport angle and that conservation came into the picture as an after-thought?

Is it really necessary to widen Hill Street and were other options explored? If Hill Street was to be widened, why not demolish Stamford House rather than Eu Court? How will demolishing Eu Court improve the traffic congestion in that area? We have already taken measures to contain traffic into the city ---

Mr Speaker: Dr Tan, are you making a speech?

Dr Tan Cheng Bock: No, I am not. I am going to ask more questions.

Mr Speaker: Ask your question.

Dr Tan Cheng Bock: I will ask the other questions later.

Mr Dhanabalan: Mr Speaker, Sir, Eu Court was acquired as part of a road widening programme. It is correct that when it was acquired conservation was not the objective. It was meant to be cleared to widen the road system that I mentioned. This does not mean that conservation was not considered at all. It was considered and we had to rule it out for reasons that I will explain.

Sir, the question of Eu Court and whether it should be cleared raises wider questions and, as the Member has asked, is it really necessary to widen Hill Street? I think the implication is whether it is really necessary to continue with road widening projects like the Hill Street widening project.

Members will recall that I have made many statements in this House before that the solution to our traffic problem does not lie in road widening and construction. I have also stated that we cannot keep on widening roads by taking away people's homes, gardens and knocking down old buildings. Roads already occupy 11% of land in Singapore as a whole and 21% of the land within the central area. So roads occupy a very substantial part of the land. Compare this with the 11% of the land that is taken up by housing in Singapore as a whole and 40% of the land within the central area that is taken up by buildings, we can see quite clearly that there are very severe limits to increasing traffic capacity by widening or building new roads. We just cannot keep on widening or building new roads.

Our traffic problem has to be addressed with two sets of measures and Members are familiar with at least one set, ie, controlling the growth of the car population. The second set of measures relates to making better use of existing roads and minimising the need to widen roads or even constructing new roads within the city area. Of course, outside the city, we will still be building new roads to connect new population centres.

Members are familiar with the various measures that have been introduced and that will be introduced to control the growth of the car population. I need not elaborate on this further except to say that many of the people who deplore the proposal to demolish Eu Court on the grounds that priority should be given to people rather than cars, are less vocal when it comes to measures to control the car population. Controlling the car population does not mean zero growth, at least for the moment. We have to plan for some growth, though a moderate growth. Planning for growth means that we cannot entirely avoid building new roads and widening old roads. But in planning for roads within the central area, PWD has been given clear instructions that its energies and resources should be focused on putting in systems that will increase the capacity of the existing roads rather than widening or building new roads. These will include measures like computer-controlled traffic lights and depressed junctions to increase flow of traffic, remote-controlled cameras to stringently enforce "No Waiting" and "No Parking" zones and other such measures. Electronic Road Pricing is an evolving technology that we shall introduce, when appropriate.

The Public Works Department (PWD) is also embarking on a technical and economic feasibility study to build tunnel-roads, which will have a less-damaging impact on the environment and help to take traffic through sections of the city without clogging up the surface roads. But this is an expensive solution. One kilometre of a tunnel-road (3 lanes) costs $50 million compared to $2.5 million for a surface road. This, of course, excludes land costs. Tunnel-roads become much more attractive when we impute the land costs for surface roads.

There will be no more substantial widening of roads within the city. Though traffic demand within the city area will increase, we cannot meet this by widening or building new roads. We have to adopt the other measures I have mentioned, ration the use of the roads, and even subject those who insist on using the city roads to suffer more congestion. Since we have decided not to widen roads within the city area, PWD has abandoned a proposal to widen North Bridge Road and South Bridge Road to a dual carriageway 6-lane highway. From a purely transportation planner's view, it would be ideal to have another east-west arterial road parallel to the widened New Bridge Road, Hill Street, Victoria Street system. But this would mean knocking down many buildings within the city. By giving up this proposal, the old shophouses in Chinatown, Boat Quay and Kampong Glam can be conserved.

Let me now take up the subject of the widening of Hill Street and Victoria Street. Hill Street, together with New Bridge Road, Victoria Street and Kallang Road, forms a very important traffic corridor linking the city and the eastern part of Singapore. There is now no serious traffic problem along this corridor, and therefore people are not able to see the need for widening this corridor. One of the difficulties that is inherent in trying to nip anticipated problems is that people generally do not see the need for preventive measures. They are better able to see the need when the problem becomes acute, but this has never been the approach to public policy in Singapore. We try to anticipate and plan well ahead, even though this sometimes causes problem for the Government in that we have to do much more explanation and persuasion to make a policy understood and acceptable. PWD's transportation studies show that it is essential to widen and improve this traffic corridor, that is New Bridge Road, Hill Street, Victoria Street and Kallang Road, in order to cater for the increasing traffic demand that is expected. But as I have stated, a parallel proposal to widen North Bridge Road and South Bridge Road has been abandoned in order to keep such works within the city area to the minimum. We have already widened the stretch from Neil Road to Coleman Street in the western end and we have also widened the stretch from Lavender Street to Kallang River in the eastern end of this corridor. Land has also been cleared for the construction of the stretch from Bras Basah Road to Lavender Street. $37 million has been spent to widen the road on the eastern and western parts of this system. We cannot allow this investment to be wasted by retaining the bottleneck from Coleman Street to Bras Basah Road. It will be a waste of public funds, and traffic flow will also be seriously affected if this bottleneck is not removed and the dual carriageway system from Neil Road to Kallang not completed.

The question is: Is there an alternative for connection from Coleman Street to Bras Basah Road? An alternative was explored to divert part of the traffic to Armenian Street and Queen Street before rejoining Victoria Street via Middle Road. This alternative is inferior both from the traffic and environmental points of view. It will require the demolition of, for example, the Tao Nan School which we hope to conserve and also the Substation which is now an active centre for cultural use by the Practice Performing Arts Centre Limited. Such an alternative will also have very adverse effects on the use of the conserved St Joseph's Institution as an art gallery. It will cause degradation of the environment along Armenian and Queen Streets, will require the widening of Middle Road to seven lanes to handle the heavy traffic flows and will require the diversion of established bus routes. For all these reasons, it is not an alternative that should be considered seriously.

The next question is, as the Member has raised, if the stretch from Coleman Street to Bras Basah Road has to be widened, which building at the Stamford Road junction should be demolished? Should it be Eu Court or Stamford House? We have examined both buildings very carefully. I have personally gone down, together with architects and engineers, to see the potentials of these two buildings. We decided to retain Stamford House and demolish Eu Court because, firstly, Stamford House has a more outstanding architectural style and most architects I have spoken to agree with this; and secondly, Stamford House has a greater potential to become an active and successful commercial centre.

Perhaps I should explain a little bit about Stamford House and why it is considered superior to Eu Court for conservation. The 3-storey Stamford House was built in 1904 by one Mr Seth Paul. It was designed by R.A.J. Bidwell of Swan & Maclaren, the same person who designed the Raffles Hotel, the Goodwood Park Hotel and other architecturally outstanding buildings. Stamford House is an appealing, romantic architectural composition with its curved central pediment and two triangular ones at either end. Stamford House, with its elaborate ornamental mouldings and carvings, is typical of the High Victorian phase of architecture. It requires, of course, some imagination and knowledge of restoration to be able to see the potential in Stamford House. It is now much encrusted with all kinds of ad hoc improvements and looks drab and unattractive. But I have no doubt that when restored, Stamford House will be more outstanding than Eu Court.

Another reason for selecting Stamford House is that it was designed and built for commercial purposes. Its layout and interior design are such that it can be easily upgraded into an impressive commercial centre with a second storey atrium. It has a void in the second storey which is very attractive. Stamford House is also closer to the MRT Station than Eu Court and we want to take full advantage of its prime location.

Eu Court is also an attractive building but not as attractive as Stamford House. It is a 4-storey retail and residential building built in the 1930s by the wealthy businessman, Mr Eu Tong Sen. Its five-footway, narrow frontage of the individual units and the way the building turns the corner are characteristics of earlier shophouse design. It exhibits simple geometric details typical of the buildings of the Art Deco Period which spanned between World War I and World War II.

Eu Court was designed with shops on the ground floor and residential flats on the upper floors. This residential design, in addition to Eu Court's "L" shaped layout, makes it very difficult to convert the building into as good a commercial centre as Stamford House. Hence, by conserving Stamford House rather than Eu Court, instead of the other way round, the land use in the area is optimised.

The decision to demolish Eu Court was, therefore, not taken lightly. It would, of course, be ideal and perfect if we can conserve both Eu Court and Stamford House. But in life, we have to make hard choices and in planning the road system in Singapore, we have to make some very hard choices. Even within my own Ministry, there are different points of view and these differences have been debated long, seriously and even furiously. URA would like to keep Eu Court. There is no greater advocate than URA when it comes to conservation. In fact, URA has been far ahead in its conservation policy than the many who have now started to espouse this cause. But having weighed all the arguments, we had to regretfully conclude that Eu Court has to go. The east-west arterial system comprising New Bridge Road, Hill Street, Victoria Street and Kallang Road has to be completed even though it involves the demolition of Eu Court and the adjacent buildings.

PWD, of course, has not been oblivious to the need to conserve old and attractive buildings that are part of our history and heritage. In determining the design and alignment of this road system from Neil Road to Kallang, every measure possible has been taken to conserve outstanding buildings along the route. The alignment has been designed to keep intact the Hill Street Police Barracks, which is an attractive building, the Central Fire Station, the Armenian Church, the Chinese Chamber of Commerce Building, the Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus and the Cathedral of the Good Shepherd.

That such care has been taken to leave intact all these buildings is a reflection of the new consciousness to conserve old buildings. Fifteen or even 10 years ago, the approach would have been quite different and ruthless. These buildings would have just gone. But when all is said and done, we cannot have all that we want. I am satisfied that, under the circumstances, we have, in the solution that we have adopted, struck the best balance between road widening and conservation.

Mr Speaker: Order. I think it is appropriate for me to remind the House that Question Time should not be used to make long Ministerial statements. Neither is it appropriate for answers to be given to questions which have not even been asked.

Dr Tan Cheng Bock: Mr Speaker, Sir, I would just like to ask the Minister that in this road widening scheme of Hill Street - I am looking at the road directory and I notice that there are so many buildings along this stretch of road - can I take it from the Minister that some of these buildings, like the St Joseph's Church, Ramada Hotel, St Anthony's Convent, US Embassy, Masonic Hall, and so on, would also have to go?

Mr Dhanabalan: Mr Speaker, Sir, I must explain that I was not answering questions that were not asked. But there were implications in the questions which I had to answer, lest I had more supplementary questions. I was only trying to anticipate. To answer his question, no, all the buildings that have to go have already been removed. St Joseph's Church, St Anthony's Convent, a hotel that he mentioned, will all be kept. All the buildings along Victoria Street will be kept and the alignment of the road has been designed to keep all these buildings. Masonic Hall is in Armenian Street.

Mr Eugene Yap Giau Cheng (Mountbatten): Mr Speaker, Sir, can I ask the Minister to clarify a point which he made in his long speech? If indeed the purpose is to subject motorists to some inconvenience by not expanding or building more roads in the city area, then why was there an announcement in the press recently to expand the PIE?

Mr Dhanabalan: PIE does not run within the city area. What I said was that within the city area, we will minimise road widening and new road construc- tion. I did also say that new road construction may be necessary to join new population centres. The PIE is the Pan Island Expressway and most of it is built into new dual four-lane carriageway, but part of it is still based on old standard and we have to widen it. But it is not part of the city road network system.

Dr Lee Siew-Choh: Would the Minister agree that despite all the discussions and arguments in the Ministry, the Government could make mistakes and, in view of such possible mistakes and in the hope of lessening such mistakes, would the Government be prepared to hold an inquiry into the matter so that objections could be made and the Government's answers given in public so that we know how the decisions have been made?

Mr Dhanabalan: I assume, Sir, that this answer that I am giving now is in public. The press is here. This is meant for Singaporeans to hear and it will also be on TV.

On whether we make mistakes, we never claim to be infallible. Of course, we make mistakes. But if Dr Lee has got a specific mistake in mind, we can discuss it. On this particular subject, I have already explained clearly why Eu Court was acquired and why the road widening is necessary. That is not a mistake.