777rainbow Why is there a forest in the middle of Orchard Road?

A forested plot of land sits between Orchard Boulevard and Ngee Ann City. The Straits Times/Asia News Network

SINGAPORE – High above the glossy malls of Singapore’s busiest shopping belt, a pink-necked green pigeon spots a tree. It is an acacia, a towering evergreen that sticks out of a dense canopy the size of three football fields.

A stone’s throw away on the pavement lining Orchard Road, mynahs squabble for crumbs and shoppers jostle for space in the overcrowded street.

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But here, in the overgrown no man’s land bordered by Orchard Turn, Orchard Boulevard and Orchard Link, there is only the brief fluttering of wings and swaying of branches.

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It is a curious space: a rare parcel of prime real estate, left untouched since the 1950s, in a country where liminal spaces are often pulverized by pragmatism.

It is not a park. Nor is it an active cemetery. There is no one fighting for it, no one using it and, apart from the occasional forum post asking “Why until now still no developments yet?”, hardly anyone pays attention to it.

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Even the multimillion-dollar makeover intended to transform Orchard Road into a lush green corridor that connects Singapore’s historical green spaces passes over this secondary forest, for which the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) has other plans.

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Perplexed but intrigued, I do a preliminary Google search, but do not get very far. A blog post here, a throwaway mention in a decade-old article there.

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I even contact the Ngee Ann Kongsi, which used to own the plot of land, to ask if it could tell me anything about its history, but am told by a friendly but apologetic employee that there is not much to add.

“If you find out, please let us know too,” she says, putting an end to our brief phone call.

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Still, I want to know how this forest came to be, why it remains untouched, what lies inside and what fate awaits it.

This is the story of my trip down that particular rabbit hole and how I end up in the lushest, most mosquito-ridden part of Orchard Road, squinting at a pink-necked green pigeon.

Pink-necked green pigeons perched on a branch in the secondary forest outside Ngee Ann City. The Straits Times/Asia News Network

Past lives

Before acacias sprouted up and creepers carpeted the ground, this section of Orchard Road was studded with tombstones.

A Teochew cemetery, Tai Shan Ting, sprawled over the expanse currently occupied by the forest, as well as Ngee Ann City, Wisma Atria, Orchard Cineleisure and Mandarin Gallery.

The about 28ha plot of land was acquired from the East India Company by Ngee Ann Kongsi in 1845, establishing Singapore’s first Teochew cemetery on the site. For the island’s Teochew community, this was a welcome – and long overdue – move.

“Many of the early Teochew immigrants who settled in Singapore were laborers who arrived alone to make a living. They lived in poverty and had little hope of returning to China to spend their final days,” says Dr Lee Chee Hiang, an associate professor in the Department of Chinese Studies at the National University of Singapore (NUS).

“For these immigrants, looking for a place for burial after dying in a foreign land became a pressing concern, as there were very few public cemeteries established by the colonial government of Singapore at that time.”

Many cemeteries then were owned by Christian or Muslim organizations, which made them inaccessible to Chinese immigrants who were not Christian, Catholic or Muslim.

But, by 1948, Tai Shan Ting had ceased to be used as a cemetery for many years, according to a Straits Budget report on a proposed scheme for building flats along its fringe.

By 1951, exhumation was under way. Over the next two years, more than 20,000 graves were exhumed, their remains interned at another Teochew cemetery in Sembawang.

Many remained unclaimed. Of 5,000 soon-to-be exhumed bodies, only 25 were claimed by relatives for reburial, wrote The Straits Times in September 1951.

It quoted an official of the Kongsi, who explained that because the graves were so old, tracing the descendants of the deceased became a challenge because even the relatives had died.

“During the late Ming and early Qing periods in China, many Teochew people involved in anti-Qing secret societies fled to Singapore to escape the Qing government persecution,” says Dr Lee.

“Unable to return home, they were buried in public cemeteries, but often did not dare to engrave their names or home towns on their gravestones. As a result, some graves at Tai Shan Ting remained anonymous, with no one able to identify or claim the remains.”

Making room for the living

Ghosts lurking in the shadows, uncleared graves hidden in the vegetation. The forest’s macabre past has given rise to all sorts of rumors, traded by employees working nearby and urban explorers passing through.

Yet the spooky stories – whatever their veracity – have not deterred developers from trying to coax families into settling down in the former cemetery.

A 1972 photo of the construction of a new road behind Ngee Ann Building through the former Tai Shan Ting cemetery. The Straits Times/Asia News Network

In 1952, the Kongsi’s plan was to turn Tai Shan Ting into a teeming residential estate, home to 20 bungalows, 84 shophouses and 423 flats. There was to be a hotel, a school, an amusement park, a cinema and an electrical substation.

Instead, the Kongsi ended up erecting Ngee Ann Building, a 10-storey development housing apartments and shops, on part of the land in 1957. It was later torn down for Ngee Ann City, which opened in 1993 to serve a commercial purpose.

The surrounding 50,000 or so sq m of land was acquired by URA in late 1979.

Over 20,000 sq m – where the forest now sits – remains undeveloped and is slated for residential use under the agency’s Master Plan.

But the URA told The Straits Times in a joint statement with the National Parks Board (NParks) that it has no immediate plans to develop the site.

The federal and state governments’ tax revenue reached a total of 86.2 billion euros ($93.54 billion) last month, according to the ministry’s monthly report.

Gorman will become chairman on Jan. 2, 2025. He will succeed Mark Parker, who is leaving after serving on Disney’s board for nine years.

Mr Nicholas Mak, chief research officer at property search portal Mogul.sg, estimates the land on which the forest sits is worth over a billion dollars, calling it a “big treasure chest of gold” that the Government can continue sitting on. Though it is not raking in dividends, its value will continue to appreciate.

“The land sale market is a bit subdued. The Government is in no hurry to sell because this is the last piece of greenfield development land so close to Orchard Road.”

Plus, he adds, there is no pressure on the Government to act on its plans for the area. “Unlike HDB, which faces high demand for new flats, there is no pressure in this case to sell super prime land to developers because buyers aren’t exactly clamouring for super prime land near Orchard Road.”

OrangeTee Group’s chief researcher and strategist Christine Sun concurs: “The Government is now concentrating on public housing, so I don’t think this area is their priority. The luxury market is slow too.”

Nonetheless, when the forest is finally turned into homes, Mr Mak believes that demand will sprout. “I don’t think home buyers here are bothered by whether the land is a former cemetery or not,” he says.

Take, for instance, the Bidadari estate, which used to be a cemetery and faced no shortage of bidders when its graves were exhumed to make way for a fresh crop of Build-To-Order flats. It was so oversubscribed that when it was launched in November 2015, there were as many as 20 applicants competing for each five-room unit.

As Mr Mak puts it: “It is a case of ‘out of sight, out of mind’. If people do not see the cemetery, they generally do not remember there was one.”

Wasteland or treasure trove?

The forest is home to many different species of plants. The Straits Times/Asia News Network

The land possesses astronomical value as a piece of real estate. But, in its current form, it is harder to quantify its worth.

Inaccessible and elevated, there is not much pedestrians can do with it. Singapore’s urban explorers and grave hunters are not terribly interested in the forest either. Of the seven I speak to, only one has ventured inside.

Mr Hikari Azyure, 47, chief executive of the Urban Explorers of Singapore, says: “Based on older records and available data in the National Archives of Singapore, the likelihood of uncovering anything significant, particularly on top of the hill, appears very slim.”

Mr Charles Goh, a regional safety manager in a construction firm who locates lost graves with his brother Raymond in his spare time, also left disappointed after a trek into the forest in the early 2000s.

The 56-year-old, who previously tracked down Ngee Ann Kongsi founder Seah Eu Chin’s grave in 2012, had heard talk of tombs buried in the undergrowth there. But all he found were small saplings, drain lines and some scaffolding material.

This former graveyard does not quite spark the same frisson of historical intrigue as Bukit Brown Cemetery, with its dense network of tombs and small but steadfast community of guardians.

But that does not mean it is devoid of importance.

Dr Lee says: “Tai Shan Ting, the largest Teochew public cemetery, held significance beyond merely providing a burial place.

“It was the first public cemetery funded by Teochew community leaders, symbolizing the spirit of mutual support and unity among Teochew people and highlighting the cohesion of the Teochew community.”

Though the land itself, now cleared of graves, no longer provides as clear a window into the past, Mr Fauzy Ismail, president of the Singapore Heritage Society, believes that it remains important because “it highlights how certain parcels of land that we are not accustomed to were used for different functions”.

Even without the tombs, I am still curious. I want to know what lies within, and it soon becomes clear that there is only one way to find out.

Ecologist Shawn Lum pointing out the different types of trees that sprouted up independently in the forest. The Straits Times/Asia News Network

Together with Dr Shawn Lum, a senior lecturer at Nanyang Technological University’s (NTU) Asian School of the Environment, I make my way to town on a Monday afternoon.

We scramble up a steep mound of earth along Orchard Boulevard and stand beneath a patchy canopy, marveling at the ecosystem that has flourished here with minimal maintenance.

Towering above us are acacias, hardy trees that can grow on nutrient-poor soils like this one.

“You can see that the ground below is leveled,” Dr Lum says, pointing at the soil beneath our feet. “When you take away the top layer of soil where all the nutrients are, you’re left with all the clay stuff below.”

There are sea apples with moss on them – which hints at decent air quality – and kelat jambu saplings that suggest the forest is undergoing a secondary phase of growth.

Overhead, I spot a couple of pink-necked green pigeons roosting in the branches of a tree. The presence of these park-dwelling birds is a good indicator that the environment offers sanctuary, notes Dr Lum.

For him, this is the perfect example of the resilience of nature. “You give it a chance and it’ll come back. Even without anybody trying – the animals just dropped the seeds here – there’s this forest sprouting up in the middle of the busiest shopping district on the island. It’s pretty amazing.”

Billion-dollar question

Though the forest has been zoned for residential use, URA and NParks say they will “review the plans for the site taking into consideration evolving needs and demands as well as existing offerings in the city centre”.

In the meantime, ecologists like Dr Lum are free to dream.

“You don’t have a forest in the middle of Ginza or the Champs-Elysees, but we have one right here in Orchard Road. Leaving the forest here would be radical, but it just might be crazy enough to work,” he says.

The forest has been zoned for residential use, but some hope it might be turned into a park. The Straits Times/Asia News Network

But to justify the expense and the loss of revenue, he adds that it would have to be a place loved, used and needed by the general populace.

Perhaps it could be made more accessible with raised boardwalks and other modifications, or turned into a park, as the Orchard Road Business Association (Orba) hopes.

“We would love for it to be some kind of public space. It would make a great park where people could hang out. Because it’s right at the heart of Orchard Road, it’s quite well situated for something like that,” says Mr Mark Shaw, 55, Orba’s chairman.

A park like that could host music events and other lifestyle offerings that help boost the vibrancy of the district, he adds hopefully.

Additionally, preserving green spaces like this one could help combat the urban heat island effect, says Dr Perrine Hamel, Assistant Professor at NTU’s Asian School of the Environment.

“Patches of forests are the most effective at reducing temperatures, especially when they reach a certain size,” she notes, adding that they also prevent flooding by absorbing rainwater.

For Dr Lum, the forest’s significance extends beyond its practical use. He sees it as a statement of hope amid mounting eco-anxiety and disappearing secondary forests.

“Young people these days seem to be experiencing feelings of despair and anger over the future of our planet. But are there things we can do, ways we can preserve our physical environment, to show that we can heal this earth?”

Dr Veera Sekaran, a professor at NUS’ Department of Biological Sciences, meanwhile, cautions against premature tree-hugging.

“We shouldn’t rush in and say we need to protect this plot of land. There’s this balance that needs to be obtained in terms of the impact and value of that particular spot, as well as its biodiversity.”

Even if the land is eventually turned into a residential development, he suggests that parts of the greenery be retained as micro forests within the new estate so that there will still be some respite from the urban heat.

Whatever it becomes, its transformation may not drastically affect the experience of shopping in Orchard Road.

After all, the addition of a few hundred residents is unlikely to significantly affect footfall or make the streets feel more crowded. Besides, what is one more high-rise building in a steel-clad concrete jungle?

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For now, though777rainbow, the forest bides its time – overlooked by most, save for the birds.

Down The Rabbit Hole is a series in which reporters at The Straits Times chase down answers to niche questions and follow where their curiosity leads them.  Cherie Lok covers food and culture for The Straits Times. She occasionally writes book reviews too. READ NEXT Barbers raises concerns over alleged Chinese control in NGCP Legarda hails Gaza ceasefire deal, calls for sustainable peace... EDITORS' PICK WPS: Deadlines, ultimatums vs China ‘monster ship’ beyond PCG mandate – Tarriela Disney hit with $10 billion lawsuit for allegedly plagiarizing ‘Moana’ Israel says truce with Hamas begins, after delay Australian Open: Coco Gauff writes ‘RIP TikTok USA’ on TV camera Janno Gibbs defends VMX after Jinggoy Estrada calls out platform Showbiz Roundup: Vic Sotto, Darryl Yap face off in court; MMFF 2024 box office MOST READ Marcos urged not to interfere in VP Duterte's impeachment case WPS: Deadlines, ultimatums vs China ‘monster ship’ beyond PCG mandate – Tarriela DSWD comes to viral sampaguita girl’s aid; PNP summons mall guard Boholano lawyer to attend Trump inauguration as legal counsel Follow @FMangosingINQ on Twitter --> View comments