With the recent announcement of the 5 teams shortlisted to redesign Singapore’s Railway Corridor, the city-state has taken a major step towards getting it’s first urban linear park. This places Singapore among a growing number of global cities rejuvenating their built environment by replacing post-industrial remnants with their own version of New York City’s High Line.
In the post-industrial metropolis, many of the unsightly & utilitarian aspects of industrialisation have been moved away from populated city centres. This paradigm shift has left many urban areas around the world blighted with infrastructural remnants of the past. Since the completion of the wildly-successful High Line in NYC, cities around the world have begun to emulate the success of Field Operations and Diller Scofidio + Renfro‘s extremely popular railway-turned-park. Here are a few examples of successful urban interventions that have turned ugly utilities into public pleasures:
An underground alternative to the high line, New York City’s ‘Low Line’ would be the world’s first underground park, built in an abandoned underground trolley terminal, and lit by fiber optic skylights.
Chicago’s ubiquitous Millenium Park, along with much of the adjacent Grant Park, was built on an elevated deck over the railway lines which had separated the city from it’s waterfront for years.
An existing rail line in Sydney is being redesigned as an urban hub, connecting a major university and a number of cultural institutions with the city’s lively harbourfront.
Singapore’s 24km long railway corridor has a long history. It was first built by the British as a cargo rail line bringing exports from greater Malaya to Singapore’s Tanjong Pagar sea port for shipment throughout the British Empire. After independence, the rail line continued to function as a part of the Malaysian railway system.
Even when Singapore left Malaysia to become an independent nation in 1965, the length of the railway corridor remained as a strip of Malaysian land bisecting sovereign Singapore, still owned and operated by Keretapi Tanah Melayu Berhad (Malaysian Railway Company). After agreeing in 1990 to give the land back to Singapore, KTMB operations finally ceased in 2011, and the land has since been sitting vacant. The linear verdant path has captured the collective public imagination of Singaporeans and has become a popular recreational and natural retreat within urban Singapore. After years of advocacy for adaptive re-use from the Nature Society, Historical Society, and hundreds of concepts from ideas competitions & student projects… we finally have a glimpse of the future of the railway corridor!
Here are the 5 shortlisted teams announced on 18 May by the Singapore Urban Redevelopment Authority and some of their relevant projects:
TEAM 1
Lead Landscape Architect: West 8 (The Netherlands)
Lead Architect: DP Architects (Singapore)
Legendary Dutch landscape urbanists West 8 are known for their innovative urban & landscape design schemes such as the Borneo-Sporenburg Masterplan in Amerstdam, which pairs a unique urban typology with carefully sculpted green spaces and a series of finely crafted bridges for varied uses. Paired with Singaporean mega-firm DP Architects, this team is a formidable competitor.
TEAM 2
Lead Landscape Architect: Grant Associates (Singapore/UK)
Lead Architect: MVRDV (The Netherlands)
Local Architect: Architects 61 (Singapore)
Another legendary Dutch firm, MVRDV, was recently selected to design a new park in Seoul on an unused elevated highway viaduct. Teamed with Grant Associates, locally ubiquitous for their spectacular Gardens by the Bay, will doubtlessly create a very interesting scheme for the railway corridor.
TEAM 3
Lead Landscape Architect: Turenscape International (China)
Lead Architect: MKPL Architects (Singapore)
Red Ribbon Park by Turenscape Photos by Turenscape
Turenscape’s recent design for a natural park in Qinhuangdao, China features a red ‘ribbon’ that weaves through the park, functioning as lighting, seating, planters, and a wayfinding device. Will we see a red ribbon weaving through Singapore’s heartlands?
TEAM 4
Lead Architect & Lead Landscape Architect: Nikken Sekkei (Japan)
Local Landscape Architect: Tierra Design (Singapore)
This team is a surprising appearance, with the lead architect/landscape architect Japanese mega-firm Nikken Sekkei. Local architects/landscape designers Tierra Design were responsible for the new landscaping at Plaza Singapura and the landscaping at Parkroyal on Pickering,
TEAM 5
Lead Landscape Architect: Olin Partnership (United States)
Lead Architect: OMA Asia (Hong Kong)
Local Architect: DP Architects (Singapore)
After seeing what has been done by the winning teams, really looking forward to seeing the exhibition of the shortlisted schemes in October/November 2015 when the winner of the competition will be announced!
