Mount Pleasant BTO HDB Guide: 5,000 HDBs to be built at Onraet Road Old Police Academy from 2025

Six HDB Build-To-Order (BTO) projects comprising about 5,000 homes will be built in the upcoming Mount Pleasant housing estate, with the first one to be launched in 2025.

Black & White Colonial Bungalows

Heritage elements from the Old Police Academy and pre-war black-and-white bungalows, along with the surrounding greenery, will be sensitively woven into the design of the new 33ha housing estate, said the Housing Board (HDB) on Thursday.

The estate, which is around one-third the size of Bidadari, sits close to Bukit Brown and the Central Catchment Nature Reserve.

HDB said it has appointed a heritage consultant, Studio Lapis, to guide efforts to salvage heritage elements and reuse them in the new estate.

Old Police Academy

This includes possibly salvaging the trusses, beams and columns of the old drill shed – one of the earliest buildings to be constructed in the Old Police Academy – and incorporating them into the new estate.

Designed as an outdoor training space with a metal roof structure, the shed was once a popular space for police events and activities such as foot drills, medal ceremonies and band performances.

Old Drill Shed to be Preserved

The large, column-free covered space served as a training area during rainy weather and could accommodate several companies of trainees for foot drills.

Studio Lapis will inspect and survey the shed to pick out any architectural and structural defects before carrying out tests to assess the feasibility of reusing the trusses as structural elements in the future, said HDB.

This will determine how the retained heritage items should be dismantled and stored, HDB added. The findings will also guide HDB on how to incorporate these items into the design of the BTO projects.

Old Police Academy Swimming Pool

The Old Police Academy Workgroup, which was formed to assess how to preserve the academy’s rich heritage, also recommended giving the starter blocks at the swimming pool a new lease of life as street furniture.

The 50m by 30m Olympic-size swimming pool was opened in February 1977, after then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew in 1972 mooted building a pool to equip police officers with basic swimming skills.

On weekdays, the pool was used by trainees and officers from police divisions. It was open to members of the police force and their families in the evenings and on weekends.

The academy also housed a 30m by 8m wading pool, a two-storey building with changing rooms, and a multipurpose hall.

Onraet Road

To enhance the distinctiveness and identity of the estate, the workgroup proposed new names for two roads, Mount Pleasant Avenue and Old Police Academy Road, to go with the existing gazetted road names – Onraet Road and Wong Chin Yoke Road, said HDB.

The Street and Building Names Board endorsed all four road names in May 2023.

6 Police Buildings to be Preserved

HDB had previously announced that it would retain six buildings in the area that were assessed to be the most representative of the police’s historical, social and architectural heritage.

Of these, four blocks – Blocks 1, 2, 27 and 28 – within the new housing estate will be adapted while the two remaining blocks – Blocks 13 and 153 – outside the estate have been identified for proposed conservation.

Speaking to reporters during a visit to the site on Thursday, Minister of State for National Development Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim said the workgroup looked at a list of more than 40 existing buildings and narrowed down the key ones that are significant to the police fraternity.

Preserving Heritage in new BTO estates

The effort to incorporate rich heritage into a new public housing estate exemplifies how Singapore is able to balance competing needs while developing sites that are appropriate and benefit its people, said Associate Professor Faishal, who chairs the workgroup.

“We hope in this journey not only to preserve, but to make the process, as well as the outcome, alive for our people to relieve the heritage of the Old Police Academy,” he added.

Bound by Thomson Road and the Pan-Island Expressway, and located close to the mature town of Toa Payoh, the Mount Pleasant area has been earmarked for residential development in the Urban Redevelopment Authority’s Master Plan since 1998.

Residents will be served by Mount Pleasant MRT station on the Thomson-East Coast Line, which will be opened in tandem with the completion of the new BTO projects.

HDB noted that the process of conceptualising and building new housing areas typically takes several years.

Brownfield Project

For brownfield sites (meaning there was a previous development on the land) with existing buildings such as Mount Pleasant, land preparation and infrastructure works may take three to five years, depending on the complexity of the site.

There may be a need to relocate existing users, clear existing structures, and divert underground services such as cables and sewers, said HDB.

For greenfield sites (meaning there are no existing buildings on the land), HDB said it needs to ensure supporting infrastructure such as roads and sewers are ready, and conduct extensive soil investigations.

HDB added that it pays special attention to a site’s ecological and heritage significance, to ensure it is developed sensitively and sustainably.

In the case of Mount Pleasant, HDB started conducting impact studies and engaging nature and heritage groups in 2018, seven years before the first BTO project is slated for launch in 2025.

This article was first published in The Straits Times.