SEA HABITATION: BUILDING ON WATER TO COMBAT URBAN CONGESTION IN SINGAPORE

Abstract

With a dense population of more than 5 million people, the prevalent planned increase of population mainly due to the immigrants in Singapore is further worsening the problem of land scarcity, which leads in urban congestion. Singapore faces the challenge of planning for all the spatial functions required by the people and fitting them within 700square km without compromising on the current standard of comfort. It is crucial for Singapore to explore new technology and innovative solutions to increase its land capacity when technology advancement has offered new opportunities and solutions for Singapore to adopt. The notion of living on sea is raised as an alternative to address this issue. The paper will analyse the current strategies employed to ease urban congestion in terms of their effectiveness and explain how sea habitation would be a better alternative in the long term. It will also present research on the brief history of construction on sea, its related technologies and different foundation systems. 3 constructed case studies are studied in detail. These are then analysed to understand how it can be applied in Singapore context. A set of future projections on the applications of sea habitation technology in urban planning would be suggested.