Masters Thesis Research and Design Report (Vivienne Kang) by Vivienne Kang

HYDR SOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

REINSTATING CANALS AS URBAN COMMONS VIVIENNE KANG MIN | AR5807 ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN THESIS REPORT UNDER THE SUPERVISION OF DR. ZHANG YE

Thank you to my parents who

provided me timely encouragement and unconditional love

Thank you to my friends who

took the time to hear out my thesis and laughing off the silly mistakes together

Thank you to my studio mates who

stuck it out all the way to the end through the full studio sessions every week

Thank you to Prof ZY who

patiently and very earnestly guided me in my thesis the past year

Thank you to my sister who

shared in the tears and joy of every studio sessions and midnight banters

Thank you to Gimli who

provided immense emotional support during my dullest moments

Thank you to my boyfriend who

blessed me with so much emotion and physical support

AR5807 THESIS REPORT

Semester 2 AY 2020/2021

ABSTRACT

1 PREAMBLE Water, where? A Canal Context Probe

2 THESIS SCOPE Thesis Statement Hypothesis Opportunities

3 HYDRO-CENTRIC DISCOURSE ON URBAN DEVELOPMENT Adopting the Hydro-logical Trajectory Investigating Water’s Place in Singapore The Consequuence of Framing ‘Water as Resource’

4 ALTERNATIVE VALUATION OF WATER IN URBAN ENVIROMENTS The Hydrosocial Approach Repositioning Water’s Value Praxis

5 SPATIAL OPPORTUNITY: A FRESH APPROACH TO MASTER PLANNING Critique on the Notino of Sustainable Urban Development How do corporates exploit ‘sustainability’ globally Contextualised in Singapore

6 SYSTEMS DESIGN INTENT Spatialising Canals as Sites of Amphibious Urban Assemblages Urban Commons to Anchor Urban Resilience Collective Urban Resilience as Proxy for Economy Prosperity Benefitting from Economic Agendas of State Conglomerates

7 DESIGN INTERVENTION

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE: REINSTATING CANALS AS URBAN COMMONS Water is a vital source of life; culture is people’s way of life.

ABSTRACT Spatialising water in Singapore’s urban fabric, canals exist as a physical extension of the government’s hegemonic control of water. The separation of culture and water has resulted in the detriment of water-wise communities, and are ironically, increasingly reliant on water governance to provide a consistent supply of treated water. It is clear that these hard, artificial boundaries are no longer the sources of pollution they used to be, yet the urban fabric has not integrated them back into our communities yet. This thesis charts the extent of neglect canals have suffered due to the hydro-logical approach of Singapore’s water governance, and how socio-environmental issues serve as key opportunities to jumpstart the hydro-social transformation of our waterways. Pivoting on the issue of master planning in Singapore in balancing our economic and social demands, this thesis proposes the redevelopment of canals as amphibious assemblages for the various social values of water demand to manifest. The interventions tackle the consequences arising from the separation of culture and water, including environmental degradation. A critique on the notion of sustainable urban development is also raised, questioning the effect and influence that state corporates have in shaping the built environment as the government’s economic arm. Tiered architectural and urban interventions are pursued, illustrating how hydro-social water governance can redirect state conglomerates’ economic agendas in realising urban resilience, manifesting as urban commons.

1 | PREAMBLE

Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink

Water, where? A Canal Context

The extensive canal network in Singapore exists as a spatialisation of institutionalised hydro-logical water valuation, causing waterways to lose their significance and utility to the public. Impassible along most parts, these concretised channels exist as dead and wasted spaces only activated during wet weather to quickly channel away stormwater runoff. Canals permeate Singapore’s urban fabric, and by extension, is the main influence of day-today interaction of communities. These surface catchments are valuable to Singapore’s urban and water resource planning as they facilitate ordering of urban areas. Boasting a network of 990km and 20m wide at stretches (PUB, 2020), they are crucial in preserving livelihoods and are glorified in defining the hard edge between communities and water. Yet, in their static maintenance of urban landscapes, they are shunned by people due to its monofunctional focus on separating conditions rather than integrating

Figure 1: Singapore’s Blue Net-

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Figure 2: Consolidation of water

Probe

Through what frameworks might we be able to understand the approach of hydro-logical governance in Singapore and the subsequent effects on the inherently hydro-social landscape? Unveiled through observations on the current imbalance of water valuation, incessant grey infrastructure upgrades, and the lack of engagement with the public in securing our water supplies illustrates the single-sided dominance the government has over the urban built environment. In subjugating water, the state is able to assert sovereignty, and this grants them the power to invoke planning parameters and infrastructure to grow the economy. This has unfortunately, through the top-down provision of water services, commodified water and resulted in detached attitudes towards water and associated infrastructure. While the government implores people to ‘make every drop count’ (PUB, 2019) to maintain the water prices and supplies for future generations, water demand projection remains unrealistic for domestic users. Although individuals are expected to cut daily usage by 10L from 141L (2018 estimates) to just under 130L by 2030, their industrial counterparts are forecasted to have an unbridled surge in water use by almost 2 times of current quantities by 2060 (PUB, 2018). This disparity in the water conservation message and statistics would not encourage people to reduce their demand since their individual actions would not amount to anything in comparison with industries. Such dialectics between practical water governance and the social needs of communities questions the role that architecture can play in reconciling these differences. How might a new urban grid challenge these artificially imposed restrictions in liberating the communities’ physical and psychological connections with water? The ability of architecture to foreground the importance of collective public and government efforts will be crucial to solving this urban water crisis. HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

2 | THESIS SCOPE Thesis Statement

The Hydrosocial Assemblage mobilises a series of land-water urban typologies to synchronise water sensibilities along the vast network of canals. A critique on the hydro-logical approach of water governance in Singapore, this thesis leverages on the drive for sustainable urban development to acculturate hydro-social planning parameters in challenging the status quo of land-water parcellation. The alternate decentralised approach is propelled by the possibilities of disruptive innovation and water’s mutability in realising new synergies between water-centric communities and in the process, strengthening collective urban resilience of diverse local communities.

Hypothesis

In light of evolving global attitudes towards water, this thesis explores the possibility of integrating canals into the urban grid in expanding the social values of water demand. This conceives new urban typologies that can set in motion the change from the current hydro-logics of governance towards a hydro-social approach of sustainable urban development. This thesis reimagines the conventional approach to urban development with disruptive urban innovation that elevates canals as a hydro-social highway in catalysing the formation of smart water sharing networks. Probing the motivations of urban development in Singapore, this thesis also questions the effect and influence that state corporates have in shaping the built environment as the government’s economic arm. Through architecture and urban interventions, it illustrates how the government can incentivise the private market to orchestrate new values for public datums central to the forging of water-centric identities, culminating as an amphibious assemblage that is representative of a new urban resilience manifested as urban commons.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Opportunities Trans-communal - In expanding people’s relationships with water and the urban environment, new synergies can be fostered among communities to encourage better social cohesion as part of a larger urban assemblage that reflects the mutability of water. Trans-valuation - Water’s omnipresence pervades every aspect of our lives, including our relationship with the environment [Moore, 1925]. How might water be wielded, to upkeep environmental standards while facilitating urban development in a sustainable manner? Trans-boundary - canals are boundaries that have the potential to both repel or attract communities; such adjacencies are interesting for it provides nnew opportunities for social interactions and re-centres the importance of water as Singapore’s lifeblood.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

3 | HYDRO-CENTRIC DISCOURSE ON URBAN DEVELOPMENT

“Water dominated every other policy. Every other policy has to bend at the knees for our water suvival.” (Lee Kuan Yew, 2008)

Adopting the Hydro-logical Trajectory

In considering the hydro-logical cycle, emphasis is placed on the behaviour of water in the natural environment (Horton, 1931) and how the understanding of water’s science rendered water as a ‘calculable coherence’ (Heidegger, 1977). Singapore’s state-hydraulic paradigm framed water as ‘resource’ to push for economic and development agendas, and this was typified by emphasis on the coordination of water supplies by the Public Utilities Board (PUB), in particular widespread water infrastructure. (Wittofogel, 1957)

Figure 3: Drawing similarities between the ‘Hydrological Cycle’ and Singapore’s ‘closed

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Priorities of urban development in Singapore have remained the same since the 1960s: catering for economic growth with a good quality of life. Water governance, in complying with economic and development agendas of the nation, framed water through these three lenses - water as destructive force, water as environmental indicator and water as scarce resource. These three facets water governance had to deal with in order to close the water loop was a pragmatic approach adopted in physically separating water and society; this fast-tracked Singapore to become self-sufficient in water so as to sustain rapid urban development and economic growth within its compact 725.1sqkm landmass.

This also induced a shift towards relying on water governance to secure our waters. Such a mindset was perpetuated with the government’s constant water campaigns and declarations of important milestones that ‘closed the water loop’. Since the inception of Singapore’s 4 national taps, 4 desalination plants, 5 NEWater plants, and 8 waterworks have been built in the last 40 years. By 2012, former PUB chief Chew Mun Leong suggested that Singapore could be self-sufficient in her water supplies ‘if need be’ (PUB, 2012). Coupled with water campaigns refreshed every 10 years, the message has changed from a ‘survival rhetoric’ to one that prioritises sustainable and energy-efficient methods. Clearly, Singapore had dealt with water shortage in an overly effective manner.

Figure 4: Wasteful habits and desensitised attitudes surveys In overcoming this insurmountable challenge, the development of water services was accelerated to support economic development and urbanisation. This regrettably led to the other value dimensions of water being forsaken and the public’s involvement removed from this cycle. With the assurance given that the government will assume responsibility for this ‘resource’, people’s attitudes deteriorated and distanced from the concept of water scarcity. In surveying Singaporeans on their perceptions on the state of water locally, the 2019 PUB-commissioned study revealed that young and teenage children ‘viewed water scarcity as a “distant concept”’ and that ‘younger Singaporeans felt little urgency to conserve water as it is readily available in taps’ with ‘technologies like NEWater and desalination which allowed Singapore to diversify its water resources’ (PUB, 2019). Not only did they not value the waters in our environment, wasteful habits surfaced; this meant that water services would have to constantly upgrade and increase the efficiency of supply. This inescapably turns water into a commodity (with use value, exchange value, and being priced to reflect the cost of producing the next drop of water). This is a vicious cycle that perpetuates in the government’s favour in asserting socio-political hegemony.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Investigating Water’s Place in Singapore

To determine existing canal conditions, spatial analyses of canals was done through extensive curation of images, maps and plans from primary and secondary sources. News reports and official government publications were drawn up as well in scrutinising their writing stance to draw conclusions. A general typology of existing canal interfaces is compiled to understand and draw links, or the lack thereof, between communities according to land demarcations. Different planning scales were identified as well to understand how canals fit into the existing mode of land use master planning. Data compilation included canal and tributary names, as retrieved from PUB and online databases, whereas width of canals and network distances were estimated from satellite imagery and relative scaling with its surroundings.

The Consequences of Framing ‘Water as Resource’

In disentangling water from ecology and society, water has been treated as a discrete resource that could be exploited and manipulated without regard for the complex socio-cultural relations with water. However, existing canal conditions have given rise to drawbacks that run counter to the aims of people’s relation with water in our urban context. This mode of management that ‘frames water as resource’ is analysed from 4 facets (social, physical, environmental, economic) in categorising the associated drawbacks.

Social: Removal of communities causes social dissociation with canals and waterways

Since Singapore’s independence in 1965, rapid urbanisation took place and this meant massive resettlement undertakings in clearing out kampong dwellings to make way for the HDB flats to house over 80% of the population. In the largest resettlement scheme to take place along Kallang River and Singapore River, over 44,000 squatters and industrial sites were cleared (Dobbs, 2002). Clearing the land paved the way to intensify developments to support Singapore’s population growth with limited land and water resources. Coupled with the Singapore River cleanup set in motion by late Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew from 1977- 1987, the decade of overhaul saw the eviction of pollutive farms along the entire waterway, as well as the removal of bumboats and relocation of hawkers into hawker centres equipped with proper sanitation facilities. The strict pollution regulations set in place helped to improve the overall water quality. Both eviction and relocation schemes removed water from people’s daily lives; by disengaging people from their source of life, it gave rise to a desensitised attitude towards water.

Figure 5: Longstanding social implications 10

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Even as water governance in Singapore shifts on its stance on water pollution and has progressively opened up our waterways for watersports and fishing in acknowledging the potential of canals as recreational sites, the demarcation of fishing boundaries and provision of infrastructure to mark out fishing spots are both arbitrary and lacklustre. Enforcement of such artificially-imposed restrictions is akin to fighting an uphill battle - that in trying to preserve water’s economic value, people’s exposure to water is still greatly limited and curated in their interactions.

Physical: Encroaching of boundaries due to widened canals

While researchers and scientists implore for the need for increased canal capacities in anticipating black swan climate events (CNA, 2019), there is a limit as to which canals can encroach into existing land boundaries. The government attempted to justify such spendings through ‘protecting livelihoods and communities for future generations to enjoy’, but land is scarce in Singapore and compact urban planning intensifies land use. Communities do not benefit from this on the whole as they are forced to live with this hard urban boundary since the government deems it as the most efficient and economically-viable in preserving land values. Furthermore, this strains tensions between land and sea as it is a hard boundary, giving rise to another spatial conflict - intersecting urban connections.

Figure 6: Connectivity mapping and existing waterbodies

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Figure 7: Physical Manifestation of user (mis)appropriaWhile more than ample connections are built across canals to facilitate vehicular and pedestrian connectivity across canals for an effective radius extending 400m and beyond, it highlights the spatial tension of land-water dialectics. Where flyovers cut across these channels, dark, dingy and low-ceiling spaces are created. This reinforces the negative perception of canals. Compounded by the proliferation and harbouring of illegal activities, canals are indeed a physical manifestation of a chasm between communities. Herein, water precariously treads the fine line of being a force of destruction, yet reflects badly the canal environment it currently inhabits- all due to the economic valuation of water.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Environmental: Sterile waterscape due to dredging and concretisation of channels

Existing as 2m deep sunken spaces, canals are naturally along stretches of the lowest elevation relative to its surroundings so that through gravity, water would be able to find its way from other urban surfaces and smaller drain tributaries into the bigger channels. However, the dredging carved out regular canal profiles that subvert water hydraulics in ensuring the quickest flow rates possible in channelling water into the final receptors. 4 environmental issues arise, namely:

Figure 8: Canal classifications in Singapore 1. The accumulation of litter especially in the downstream areas where mechanical contraptions are installed to catch the rubbish. In our biggest water catchment alone, Marina Reservoir accumulates over 10 tonnes of litter daily, including plastic bottles and non-biodegradable discards. (PUB, 2017) It reflects poorly on people’s awareness of the presence of canals in channeling potential floods away as well as their source of drinking water. With such stark visualisations of the litter issue in Singapore, not only does it worsen the aesthetic and stench of our urban environment, water becomes the scapegoat of our careless littering.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Figure 9: Disease and health hazards; pest infestation 2. PUB does not provide a clear definition on ‘waterways’, and there is hence a lack of regulation on pollution control for smaller drains that typically run through various communities. Out of convenience and taking for granted centralised water cleaning services, people often treat drains as dumping grounds (throwing weeds, pouring of chemicals, draining of soapy and dirt water, etc). In addition to leaf litter (1,750 tonnes for an average month (NEA, 2014))that already clog these drains, it produces nitrogen and other phosphates in high amounts that, coupled with warmer temperatures, causes eutrophication. The resultant algae bloom is an ideal nesting ground for insects that may transmit diseases. Case in point is the yearly dengue epidemic, as well as the annual midges disrupting livelihoods in what residents describe as ‘a scene out of an apocalyptic movie’ (CNA, 2019).

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Figure 10: Litter accumulation and wildlife implications 3. Stemming from the invention of canals as waterways for transport and urban flood management, riverbeds were dredged, widened and infilled with concrete so as to increase their discharge capacities while reducing fluvial discharge in ensuring consistent water quality. These clearly exploit water to serve needs and benefited the rapid industrialisation and urbanisation of Singapore. In straying away from the typology and function of natural waterways, the dewatering of these channels during low-tides and dry seasons due to the inability of canals to calibrate water levels disrupts the ecosystem of aquatic life, migratory birds and other animals. With the ecosystem unable to adapt and thrive within urban areas, Singapore’s rich biodiversity is threatened to further decline. Communities along the water edges are deprived of nature and are presented sterile waterscapes void of life.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

4. The compact nature of Singapore’s water and urban resource planning juxtaposes a variety of land uses in close proximity along and to canals due to their respective needs. While domestic sanitation standards have maintained high standards in most neighbourhoods, industries have not been held to the same stringent standards with shallow fines being imposed for repeat offenders. Compounding this issue is the inconsistency in situating pollutive industries upstream of domestic land uses. The constant state of upgrading and construction also meant that silty water discharge often goes unnoticed from construction sites. The lack of land use planning regulation on the adjacency of land uses reflect the lack of sensitivities to water flows. Although the initial intention of eviction did improve domestic sanitation and significantly reduced pollution in most of our canals, these very communities still bear the brunt of the same pollutive consequences as they are not able to fully enjoy their waterfronts. The removal of nature had tipped the ecosystem out of balance, and as these unpleasant associations with canals transpire, it forcefully separates water from its innate socio-cultural ability to bring communities together. Instead, it harbours sourness between communities over inequitable resource management.

Figure 11: Unregulated greywater discharge from localised pollution sources HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Economic: Intensified urban flooding in low-lying districts disrupts socio-economic activities

Figure 12: Inconveniences and resultant economic pressures

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

As the effects of climate change intensifies in severity and frequency of unpredictable heavy rains, the capacities of existing canal infrastructure are constantly strained. The inflexion point of urban flood management came during the succession of 2 floods along Orchard Road in 2010 and 2011, when flood waters infiltrated the basements of Wheelock, Lucky Plaza and a few other shopping malls. However, the entire upgrading process incurred a hefty bill that was nearly 50 times more than the $23 million claimed in losses. The estimated $1.7 billion of taxpayer money spent in drainage upgrading projects is significant; state media (CNA, 2019) released a documentary that explained the need for a long term investment into flood management infrastructure. The amount of economic damage incurred is exponential, as the actual disruptions caused by the floods had triggered more spending in trying to mitigate future floods.

4 | ALTERNATIVE VALUATION OF WATER IN URBAN ENVIRONMENTS The Hydro-social Approach

In establishing the crutch of Singapore’s urban development to be the one-dimensional economic valuation of water, the rationale behind hydro-logics is critical in justifying its predominance in most industrialising economies. The hydrological cycle is a social construct that conceptualises water as a physical substance in continuous circulation regardless of human activity in a consistent, uniform and rational manner (Horton, 1931). This was appropriated by Singapore in the 1960s in guaranteeing state-provided water supply over the course of the next 50years. The resultant state-hydraulic paradigm had forcefully abstracted water from its social, cultural, ecological and religious contexts, reducing it to a single substance suitable for technical applications in advancing political agendas. Rather, there has been global traction in re-evaluating interactions between urban environments and water, and how people are key to funneling this change. No longer should water be subservient to economic development agendas, but rather, should be what empowers people in the social production of space and how it in turn becomes embedded in the social dimension of the city. First mooted by Swyngedouw (1997), the hydro-social cycle presents an alternative lens for water governance - in foregrounding the nuances of interaction between society and environment, water governance should go beyond the rigid formulations about value and commodification. Their position of power is pivotal in synthesising collective manifestations of values centred around the survival, production, conservation, aesthetic, artistic and religious meanings of water situated in time, locations and scales. Water governance needs to be based on collective duties, rights and solidarity in fostering hydrosocial interactions to (re)pluracise water values (Preston, 2004)

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Echoing this is Maude Barlow in her book ‘Blue Covenant’. She takes the lead in the water commons revolution in citing the public trust doctrine first codified in 529 A.D. by Emperor Justinian of the Byzantine Empire, declaring that ‘By the laws of nature, these things are common to all mankind: the air, running water, the sea, and consequently the shores of the sea’ (Barlow, 2010). The notion of the public trust doctrine is the epitome of successful human civilisations; the water commons is a long standing legal principle which holds that certain natural resources (including air, water and oceans), are central to society’s existence and hence must be protected for the common good (Barlow, 2012). The most pertinent of the 3 water crises highlighted to Singapore’s urban development, is that of dwindling freshwater supplies. It has been the utmost priority of Singapore’s water governance, in securing our water supplies. She calls for the water conservation covenant to ‘restore watersheds, mangroves and forests’ which are ‘the kidneys of our ecosystem and freshwater. In doing so, people are liberated from the false consciousness of water security as perpetuated by the state and avoids the tragedy of our centralised technological solutions (desalination, wastewater reuse, nanotechnology) by not assuming that water is the state’s responsibility, but rather it is ‘a community program aimed at the meticulous care of thousands of people’ (Kravik, n.d.) This rings true in Singapore’s context as most of our canals used to be tributaries linked to estuaries that have been infilled and dammed to form reservoirs.

Repositioning Water’s Value Praxis

Easing into the hydro-social value praxis, the thesis investigates how community actors, decentralised scales of intervention and smart technologies can enrich the values of water flowing through the city in conceiving new water-centric communites stemming from canal networks. Singapore’s water governance must acknowledge the legitmacy of the wider community in appropriating water for their respective contexts. While Singapore seeks to bring water supply and demand under control in combating water stress, water governance in Singapore has to gradually shift away from the hegemonic approach and facilitate the fostering of trust with and between communities at various time scales. Concurrently, communities can seek more empowerment and ownership of their spaces through reciprocating and leading in ground-up initiatives that tap on the mutability of water. In recognising the plurality of sites between which connections are dynamic, this new collaboration between water governance and communities helps to improve the environment, ascertain political legitimacy, and enrich the social dimension of waterscapes. (McFarlene, 2011)

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Figure 13: Incorporating Hydro-vsocial norms into Singapore’s ‘closed water loop’

5 | SPATIAL OPPORTUNITY: A FRESH APPROACH TO MASTER PLANNING Engaging people, infrastructure and water under the hydro-social approach as the fundamental framework for water and society to make and remake each other, this thesis seeks to explore the notion of sustainable urban development in Singapore, capitalising on the potential of disruptive spatial innovation as a key driver for hydro-social governance. As a small country with a small domestic economy that relies heavily on foreign trade and investments to sustain economic growth, Singapore places immense pressure on our aging workforce and strained resources to remain relevant and efficient amidst intensifying global competition. While staying in the top 5 of the Sustainable Cities Index for 2 consecutive surveys, Singapore still falls short in attaining good quality of life and pollution progress. Compounding this issue is our subpar performance in the Sustainable Cities Water Index - Singapore ranks 22nd out of 50 countries according to their readiness in harnessing water for future success. This is mainly attributed to the widespread pollution of pre-treatment urban runoff, as well as Singapore’s high water stress rankings due to our lack of water storage areas. The correlation between quality of life and the potential of water when properly integrated is clear (WEF, 2016). What if urban environments could be reconfigured to work in water’s favour in ensuring clean runoff and act as intermittent storage areas that lessens the reliance on centralised technology to treat water. Rather than viewing water channels as discrete boundaries as another land parcellation technique, the blurring of these distinct boundaries, canals in particular, and surrounding land use through a tripartite collaboration between URA, PUB and local communities will be beneficial in increasing Singapore’s resilience in the event of dry seasons that threatens the source and quality of our waters.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Figure 14: Compare and contrast Singapore’s standings in sustainable development

Critique on the Notion of Sustainable Urban Development

What remains the biggest threat to sustainable urban development is land use valuation in pursuing economic growth. In parcelling land according to calculable monetary returns, the low risk involved makes it favourable for corporates to purchase the land for continuous resale and in the process, fragments land up even more. The increasing number of individual plots de-contextualises the environment from the place, and communities are de-contextualised from their environs as they would naturally seek out the most economically-viable work in order to continue to rent/maintain ownership of the land.

How do corporates exploit ‘sustainability’ globally

In numerous large industrialising nations where economic development and modernisation had only gained traction in the past 50 years, governments turned to large industrial conglomerates who could develop their cities within the shortest time frames. Often, these developments promise better living standards and economic growth potential; however the lack of groundup consultation meant that people’s intimate relationship with the land is at the mercy of the developer’s manipulation. The result is that people are alienated from their contexts and culturally-homogeneous cities around the world are unwittingly created. These are often sources of conflict, where local communities are evicted to make way for ‘greener developments’, yet they are not remunerated nor made relevant to the project. As with many developing countries playing catchup in economic development, contemporary urban forms in major cities are often replicas of production-oriented urbanism, where an industrial conglomerate is able to single-handed reshape the urban environment to prioritise their economic goals.

Contextualised in Singapore

This is particularly acute in Singapore’s context as we are a land-scarce nation that requires the intense use of land to accommodate an increasing population. Singapore’s equivalent of an industrial conglomerate is Jurong Town Corporation (JTC) and in the background, the Economic Development Board (EDB). Combined, both own over two-thirds of Singapore’s land. Although the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) is in charge of striking a balance between economic growth and social considerations, it will be inevitable that some clashes arise. Furthermore, our population density is also based off labour estimates needed to sustain economic growth in Singapore, which places further pressure on urban development to maintain the economic viability of land. HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

6 | SYSTEMS DESIGN INTENT Spatialising Canals as Sites of Hydrosocial Urban Assemblages

For canals to truly embody the hydro-social spirit in reconnecting the public with their waters, the water network needs to be appropriated with social-cultural activities that engage, educate and expound on the socio-environmental benefits active participation can generate. The space has to integrate the two physical elements of land and water in introducing an alternate spatial typology that embraces both wet and dry conditions towards valuing water as a medium imbued with immense social value. Recasting canals in a different light and identifying their resource potential, this thesis recognises the potential of these sunken channels as incubators of disruptive water innovations. Strategic spots are identified in response to the incumbent land use mapping in embedding the amphibious nodes, which in the long term would upheave existing spatial connotations with water and through the commoning of waters would augment urban sustainability. Backed by the hydro-social approach to water governance and the new role that water plays in sustainable urban development, canals are respatialised as hydrosocial assemblages that are holistic in its approach in reinstating the social value of water as the key driver of sustainable urban development.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Economic:Water - Food-Oriented Spaces

Prior to our modern day hawker centres, most food peddlers were situated along water bodies as that was the closest access to public utilities available. The typical neighbourhood planning model centres social amenities around hawker centres (URA, 2019), with the introduction of more mixed use facilities in order to compact more services within the same plot that would have otherwise only housed a single hawker centre. Also, marketplaces can serve as the new hubs of food acculturation, where people can come together to co-produce and co-consume their produce.

Physical:Water - Spatial Congruity

Removal of this hard boundary and assimilating it with adjacent spaces encourages the flow of new synergies across communities that would otherwise have been segregated by these canals. Recent trends see more waterfront projects in Singapore increasingly embracing the waterways they front, but are limited by this artificially imposed boundary that is based off old planning parameters that strove to prevent pollution. Beyond altering people’s bad perception of canals, new connections can be established in exploring different physical interactions with water (over, on, in or under-water). As communities are more open to the various interactions with water, the two elements will become more integrated in the urban environment, removing the need for spatial buffers from water bodies. This space-saving intervention will generate new urban possibilities as waterfront developments now have a new niche in embodying amphibious design principles that accommodates water within their premises.

Environmental:Water - Urban Environment Quality

Communities always strive to strive to maintain the quality of their environments when they have a vested interest in the space that either gives them economic benefits or social returns. In situating water-related social activities that concurrently rehabilitates the environment, it will lead to an increased awareness of urban environment quality that perpetuates itself in a virtuous cycle. Often, the mismanagement of water in urban environments (i.e. stagnant water, improper discharge) causes disruptions that would have otherwise been prevented with improved community resilience.

Social:Water - Spatial Activation

In liberating the use of canals, these previously unactivated and underutilised spaces can host new concentrations of water activity enthusiasts (i.e. fishing, recreational kayaking) that provides new opportunities for unplanned interactions between communities. Being engaged in an activity with other people has proven to generate stronger communal bonds, while facilitating information exchange and knowledge accrution. Urban governance should proactively encourage the re-situation of water activities in stretches of waterways of close proximities to communities. The redirection of resources towards encouragement instead of enforcement would drive home a more consistent water appreciation message that is anchored on the responsibilities of communities in having a part to play in shaping their urban environments.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Figure 14: Turning implications into opportunities with the hydrosocial framework

Urban Commons to Anchor Urban Water Paradigm

Beyond sustainable urban development justifying the potential of the social dimension of water in physically and psychologically unifying communities, these amphibious social community activities foster new typologies of urban commons. Bru Laín defines urban commons as ‘social institutions that, beyond to those property regimes in which they are enrolled in, are managed by local, communitarian and participative social practices in seeking to build responses to a given demands or social necessities, and characterised by a non-commercial management of the resources they provide, as well by forms of sharing time, goods and knowledge nor regulated by the state, neither by the markets’. Along the network of canals, the amphibious assemblage has potential to support the growth of a decentralised commons for it engages with the social and humanitarian needs of communities spread through Singapore, whose infrastructure can be appropriated by various groups of users at different instances. This process acknowledges and gives recognition to communities’ activities in exchange for their water-related services. The fostering of the new urban commons therein initiates a paradigm shift on urban waters. Franco-Torres et al. articulates how the new urban water paradigm confronts growing social, technological, and environmental complexity and uncertainty, manifested, for example, in the maladaptation to climate change, depletion of nonrenewable resources, and degrading urban livability. In response, a new urban water paradigm has emerged in the last two decades within the context of a broader societal change that promotes a more organic worldview over the classical mechanistic and technocratic understanding of reality. In wrestling back physical and psychological control of urban waters in Singapore’s context, other forms of urban systems can proliferate in three separate tiers within the larger urban commons. Anchored by a circular system, water is re-used, re-appropriated and re-contextualised by various communities as it passes through the different facilities.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Collective Urban Resilience as Proxy for Economic Prosperity

As such, with the urban commons is able to contribute to urban resilience building. Defined as the capacity of a regulatory system to continuously adapt to changes, identify synergies, and avoid conflicts with its environment in order to deliver a timely and convenient set of variable functions (Franco-Torres et al., 2020), the notion of urban resilience caters to socio-cultural diversity amongst communities (Colding, 2016). Especially in Singapore where we are a heterogenous society, cultural integration is key to ensure social stability, progress and by extension, favourable economic conditions. Commons has often been cited as the ideal model to attain collective urban resilience in order to reinforce economic prosperity. Currently perpetuated through centrally managed blue and grey infrastructure, the government’s hegemonic control over Singapore is being subverted as their legitimacy is facing mounting challenges. The solution to effect urban and water governance is not to stray away from these demands, but rather, the active engagement of the commons garners strength in numbers, which conversely reinforces their goals. Herein, commoning of amphibious communities is key to urban resilience within Singapore.

Benefiting from Economic Agendas of State Conglomerates

Leveraging on the influence that state conglomerates have on Singapore’s urban fabric, government agencies can rechart their CSR roadmaps into contributing back to these new urban typologies. In allowing these corporations to fund and operate these amphibious zones, they will have the incentives to incorporate disruptive innovation to manage these water systems so as to maximise the monetary values of these ‘land’. The use of blockchain technology to monitor water quality and quantities, complemented with a spatial system that emphasises on decentralisation, protects the interest of the urban commons while reinforcing the virtuous cycle of water and society constantly remaking each other.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

Programme and Facilities Synergies

The unique context the canal presents allows this specific configuration of circular water re-use system, which, in reconfiguring existing planning parameters, encourages new community interactions with new hydrosocial spatialisations. It takes into consideration the various spatial circumstances that might be found along canal networks. This generalised model will be applicable to the entire local canal network where suitable, which the next chapter will briefly outline the selection of demonstration sites.

Selection of demonstration site

Given the sprawling nature of the canal network in Singapore, the entire country was first subdivided into 6 region, and based off the age of existing residential estates along major channels, those slated for redevelopment the soonest were identified. As one of the intentions was to bridge the divide between domestic and industrial water use disparity, the Boon Keng site in central Singapore best embodied these characteristics. Figure 15: Programme diagram outlining programmes centered around hydrosocial values In closing this chapter on canals, this thesis aspires to lay the groundwork for multiple possibilities and interpretations of these newly conceived amphibious interventions. It is crucial that the hydro-social approach to water valuation is adopted to improve physical and psychological connections with our urban waters. Powered by the social value of water, the new urban commons reconfigures entrenched land-water parcellations to realise new community interactions and when people have a claim to stake in their waters, this improves urban resilience and in turn, realises sustainable urban development without compromising on social needs.

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

7 | DESIGN INTERVENTION

The Hydrosocial Assemblage envisions a series of land-water urban typologies to synchronise water sensibilities along the vast network of canals. The alternate decentralised approach is propelled by the possibilities of disruptive innovation and water’s mutability in realising new synergies between water-centric communities and in the process, strengthening collective urban resilience of diverse local communities

HYDROSOCIAL ASSEMBLAGE

fin.