The end of Lim Chu Kang

Today, we explored the northern end of Lim Chu Kang Road, from the Lim Chu Kang Lane 4 junction to the sea.

The northernmost part of the Lim Chu Kang area, facing northwest. Blue marks the roads we explored. Base picture credit: Google Maps.

This area is as rural as Singapore can be, and compared to much of the rest of the Republic, not much has radically changed since the trunk road was completed in the early 1930s. This area is still largely used for farming, many rural tracks branching off the trunk road still exist (but are unfortunately out of bounds, within the Mindef training area), and the trunk road itself remains a single-lane dual carriageway (albeit paved, painted with road markings, and lit).

We took the opportunity to check out Bahtera Track, which runs west from Lim Chu Kang Road to near the coast. The track is one of Singapore Island’s last unpaved, unlit roads - a great example of how the island’s rural roads were once like. The track is relatively new, though - I guess it was carved out around 20 years ago, to serve the adventure camps facing the sea. Bahtera Track took its name after Jalan Bahtera (“Ark Road”), which is far older; most of the latter has survived development, but lies inside the Mindef training grounds.

The junction of Bahtera Track and Lim Chu Kang Road.

The adventure camps served by Bahtera Track.

Bahtera Track.

The Singapore Scout Association Sarimbun Camp, served by the track. It was deserted.

Near the sea, there is a large bronze memorial marking the location where the Japanese stormed the beaches on the night of 8 February 1942 - the start of seven days of battle, culminating in the surrender of Singapore on 15 February. A quiet and solemn reminder that this remote, peaceful area was once the site of a bloody struggle between forces battling for the dominance of the Pacific.

The sea itself is not accessible today for security reasons.

From the Bahtera Track junction, we walked north along Lim Chu Kang Road to the sea.

This is Lim Chu Kang’s northernmost bus stop, B01.

It serves just one looping bus service, SMRT Bus Service 975. Buses halt at a bay just short of the stop for around five minutes, which allows the driver to take a pee break. They then make a three-point turn and return where they came from, all the way back to Bukit Panjang Integrated Transport Hub.

A short distance north of Bus Stop B01 is the end of Lim Chu Kang Road. A jetty lies beyond, but it is accessible only to the Coast Guard, and I guess inhabitants of the kelongs on the Straits of Johor.

And here’s a picture of me working hard, thanks to Tiak!

I hope the rural nature of Lim Chu Kang lives on indefinitely. Urban Singapore needs it.

28 years apart

A Reddit user, Daveliot, posted this 1981 photo of the junction of Smith Street and Trengganu Street, in Chinatown:

Credit: Daveliot.

So many things going on here - the busy roadside market and food stalls that have completely closed off the road; the trishaw rider waiting for a fare on his vehicle; the shophouses still occupied by residents; the old street name plates with four-digit postal codes; the bicycle with a licence plate (back when the vehicles had to be registered with the Registry of Vehicles); the absence of lane markings on the roads.

The same location in 2009, 28 years later:

Credit: Google Maps.

One word: Gentrification.

(The block of high-rise flats in the distance is part of Hong Lim Complex.)

Milestone Rapid Transit

A Reddit user, EconomicSanction - no doubt a history and transport buff - crafted this excellent map: Singapore’s old road milestones (which were phased out in the 1970s), plotted on a present-day map of the island, in the form of MRT stops; each “stop” is named after a place name or landmark found there. Great job!

Credit: EconomicSanction.

This map is a vivid illustration of how Singapore’s old trunk road system has been rendered obsolete by the expressway system, and dismantled by islandwide urban renewal - something that’s covered in my book Jalan Singapura. The “stops” remind us of communities and places that have been lost to development - Ama Keng, Hong Kah, Nee Soon, Tongkang Pechah, Kampong Gulega, and so on. And these are just places at every mile mark - there are others at ½-mile marks, and ¼-mile marks...

Ama Keng Village in 1986. Credit: National Archives of Singapore.