Surbana Jurong has secured a 15,000-unit affordable housing project in Gujarat, India, marking a significant milestone for the company as it extends its affordable housing expertise beyond Singapore.
The project, awarded by the Gujarat Housing Board, will see Surbana Jurong provide master planning, concept design, design review and project management services for approximately 15,000 homes across 12 sites in the next four years. These sites are located in cities with high population densities – Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara and Rajkot.
The project will incorporate some of Singapore’s best practices to make Gujarat’s public housing more vibrant, sustainable and liveable, revealed Surbana Jurong. The concept design embodies key principles drawn from Singapore’s townships, including connectivity, environmental sustainability, social community, safety, universal design, construction productivity and maintainability.
Surbana Jurong said the township design for the Gujarat project will foster social interactions by featuring community-centric spaces such as roof gardens, activity courtyards, playgrounds and outdoor fitness stations. These facilities will be located within safe and vehicular-free community spaces.
The Gujarat townships will also include some of Singapore’s distinctive public housing features, like void decks. There will be other modern lifestyle amenities as well, such as sky gardens, outdoor dining areas, meditation decks and play lawns. These features are considered new to Gujarat, expected to set a precedent for future affordable housing in India.
According to Surbana Jurong, the concept plan also ensures that each housing plot has its distinctive design and unique identity, in response to the cultural and geological context of each site. To ensure construction productivity, the design of the townships will be modular and adaptive to suit different sites.
Gujarat Housing Board has built homes in urban cities such as Ahmedabad, Surat, Rajkot, Bhavnagar, Jamnagar, and towns such as Bhuj, Vapi, Bharuch, Veraval, Porbandar and Gandhidham. The Board is committed to achieve the target set by the Prime Minister of India to provide housing for all by 2022.
“We are inspired by Singapore’s public housing model,” said Lochan Sehra, commissioner of Gujarat Housing Board. “We believe that through Surbana Jurong’s deep expertise and strong track record in Singapore’s public housing and global townships, we can redefine public homes in Gujarat and uplift the residents’ quality of life. Many of the features are new to Gujarat and will potentially set a precedent for future affordable housing in India.”
Wong Heang Fine, group CEO of Surbana Jurong commented, “Over the last five decades, we have master planned 26 townships that have housed over 80% of Singapore’s population. We are honoured to work with Gujarat Housing Board to bring our experience in designing and master planning Singapore townships to Gujarat. Singapore’s best practices and unique aspects in public housing will be incorporated in Gujarat’s public housing projects. We will be opening our Gujarat office in early December 2019 to oversee the completion of this housing project.”
