JURONG LAKE DISTRICT AS A REGIONAL CENTRE: EVIDENCE OF SUCCESS AND IMPLICATIONS TO PLANNING

Abstract

Unveiled by then Minister for National Development, Mr Mah Bow Tan, on 4th April 2008, Jurong Lake District (JLD) is envisioned to be the largest commercial centre outside of Singapore’s traditional city centre at Raffles Place. Spreading over 360ha, the site that comprises of 2 precincts – Jurong Gateway, the area surrounding Jurong East MRT station, and Lakeside, is set to be transformed from the once vacant land into an attractive place for both business and leisure purposes. This paper aims to evaluate the success of JLD by studying the impact of these developments at JLD on condominium transactions in the neighbouring towns – Bukit Batok, Clementi, Jurong East, and Jurong West, before and after the announcement of the plans for JLD. The study then goes one to discuss the implications of JLD to planning by comparing JLD and Tin Shui Wai, a failed example of a subcentre in Hong Kong. The data sample used for the regression analysis was extracted from REALIS and consists of 19,474 condominium transactions located in the four towns. The period of analysis is for 11 years from 2003 to 2013. The study found that the price premiums are not constant across the four towns. The greatest impact was seen in the Jurong East planning area where a 19% premium was observed. However, it should be noted that the developments at JLD have not fully mature. Several other developments such as retail, office, hospitality, entertainment and leisure developments are underway. Hence, the premium found in this study, though significant, is likely to change when JLD is fully established in a few years’ time. These findings will serve as a guide for other academia researches in the future.