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Unity Straits of Johor, Singapore and Malaysia

Ong Wee Jin (MArch\ Associate Professor Erik L’Heureux)

CitycoresofSingaporeandIskandarmergeviaanextensivenetworkofsurface and sub-terranean links. Access from one to another is direct and convenient, served by adequate and expansive infrastructures of road and rail alike.

At the center of all this lies the strait as an emerging third space, the binder of once divided soverignities. A softer union can be read as having always been present - the geographical basin formation that feeds into the strait.

A singular thriving hub. Highly connected, highly supported. City cores of Singapore and Iskandar merge via an extensive network of surface and subterranean links. Access from one to another is direct and convenient, served by adequate and expansive infrastructures of road and rail alike.

The Johor Strait is re-conceptualised not as a dividing line of tension but rather a unifying territory and a liquid asset. Its fingers reach into both sides and bind them as one. It shifts from being a barrier to glue.

AseriesofbarragesareimplementedatstrategicpointsalongthewesternStrait. These double up as four additional crossings put in place between the current Tuas and Woodlands causeways. Key economic activities and ecosystems such asthePasirGudangPortandPulai/JohorRiversareleftrelativelyuninterrupted.

Amanda Wong (MArch\ Associate Professor Erik L’Heureux)

InSingapore,thestateconsciouslyandcontinuouslydeniesitscitizensofaccess to the sea. The central metaphor of an island is erased by the state’s prodigious land reclamation, and subsequent denial to the sea. Most of the island’s edges are cordoned off by massive sea walls or owned by the state for economic development.In addition to the formation of a clean territory, the hard edge also amplifies divide, leaving small point of porosity between the land and sea. This thesis is interested in studying these last interfaces, these liquid territories that connect land and sea.

The built environment is systematically cleaned, maintained and replaced as a form of resistance towards tropical forces of decay. The “architecture of leaks”, in this regard, operates like a form of parasitic-growth, that allows the island to purge itself of waste and water. It carves, diverts and tunnels, aggressively altering the landscape, creating a network of infrastructural territory that is untouched by any other form.