Where is the lift lobby? Newer Build-To-Order HDB void decks are causing confusion among residents, visitors

Where is the lift lobby? Newer Build-To-Order HDB void decks are causing confusion among residents, visitors New Build-To-Order (BTO) flats have been designed to have better privacy, but have irregularly-shaped void decks as a result, according to the Housing and Development Board. Can more signage fix residents' navigation woes? Or are BTO void decks due for a redesign? Since starting her home business two years ago, Ms Nabila Ghani has learnt that delivering baked goods to her customers living in Build-To-Order (BTO) estates is no walk in the park. "When I know I'm doing a delivery at newer areas, I always look at Google Maps at least 10 times and find multiple routes in case I get lost," said the 30-year-old who runs 222 Bakehouse. New estates in Punggol and Bidadari have been the most confusing to navigate, she said. She once took 20 minutes to find the correct lift lobby up to a unit. It seems that being a resident at one of these estates does not guarantee familiarity either. Ubi Grove resident Christina Chua, 38, still finds herself making the wrong turns around her estate even after over four years of living there. "We started making friends on the neighbourhood Telegram chat but when we tried to visit them, we kept going to the wrong block. Now the first thing we ask them is 'What colour is your block?'" said the consultant. Blocks in her estate are painted different shades of green, ranging from pastel green to a deeper olive. It's a simpler visual cue, she explained, than following block numbers. Part of the reason for her navigation difficulties stems from the fact that blocks in one portion of the estate are arranged in a roughly circular formation, with blocks A, B, C and D positioned around a central open space. The blocks in the other portion of the estate are arranged in rows, with blocks A, B, C and D lined up alongside one another. Still, going by colour isn't fool proof. Blocks 356A to D are all teal, so you might be forgiven for assuming that there is some correlation between colour and block number. Cross over to the next blocks, however, and that logic falls apart. Blocks 357A and B, as well as 358A and B, are a pale green. And blocks 357C, 357D, 358C and 358D are olive green. It seems that navigating BTO estates can be a struggle for visitors and residents alike. CNA spoke residents across four BTO estates who had a variety of complaints ranging from dealing with cancellations from lost private-hire drivers to frustrations over winding paths, as well as feeling stifled by the walls in their void deck when they return home each day. Public housing design is a matter of balancing different tradeoffs, and certainly is no simple undertaking. But how well do design choices in BTO estates meet residents' needs? What are the daily frictions that they have to live with? TREADING WINDING PATHS While Housing and Development Board (HDB) flats with long corridors and open, regular-shaped void decks used to be the norm decades ago, modern public housing estates now have a new, distinctive look. Minimalist, almost grid-like facades often distinguish newer estates; the tell-tale sign of a BTO flat is usually the dense, irregularly-shaped void deck. Over at Tampines GreenOpal, like many other BTO flats, the units are arranged in a butterfly-like cluster, with the front doors facing inwards and most windows facing outwards. Void decks, naturally, take the shape of the units above, and linkways connect each cluster on the ground level. When marketing executive Uzen Tan first moved into the estate last November, he was so frustrated with its layout that he took to TikTok to air his complaints, eventually gathering enough traction to make it onto digital news platform Stomp. Nearly a year on, the frustration has waned somewhat, but many of the 31-year-old's complaints about the navigation issues remain. When this reporter visited his estate on Oct 15, temporary wayfinding signs pointed us in the direction of landmarks such as letter boxes, lift lobbies and neighbouring blocks. The laminated A3 signs have been around since he moved in, said Mr Tan, adding that he is unsure when more permanent signage will be put up. It's easier to get your bearings in older HDB blocks, observed Mr Tan. "But over here you can't because it's the way that the blocks are – the tight corners and turns and I think also lack of signage." He frequently encounters dead ends as he navigates the estate, he said. And even though there are paths around the void decks denoted by the flooring, many of them are winding, said Mr Tan. Residents end up crossing low walls, cutting across landscaping and creating their own more direct paths. There's another downside to the irregularly shaped void decks that quickly becomes apparent. As we rounded a corner at Mr Tan's estate, we witnessed a near collision between a man pushing a trolley and a lady on a bicycle. "There's a blind spot here. It's a big problem because I have a young daughter. Sometimes there's construction materials being moved around and people on bicycles," he said. For some in Tampines GreenOpal, however, these small frictions are bearable. Retiree Roland Soh, 70, was upbeat as he told CNA, "Of course, the old void deck is easier to manoeuvre. But then again, your neighbours may be next door to each other or the corridors are narrower." Over at Ubi Grove, where units are also arranged in clusters, with front doors facing the common corridor, the void decks take on an irregular shape, similar to Tampines GreenOpal. Ms Chua, who has been staying at Ubi Grove for nearly five years, says she faces the same issue with dead ends and winding paths. One of her biggest gripes is being able to see landmarks such as bus stops and multistorey carparks, but encountering bushes or low walls when she tries to take the most direct route there. The "proper" path often ends up being long and meandering, she said. She pointed to the bus stop beside her block as an example. When she first moved in, there was no direct path to it. Residents had to walk the length of the block to get to the pavement, then double back to get to the bus stop. Ms Chua's neighbours took matters into their own hands, laying down their leftover floor tiles to create a makeshift path. However, the authorities eventually removed the tiles after a resident slipped and fell, said Ms Chua. She offered a wry smile as she described how the tiled path was repeatedly removed by the authorities and reinstated by residents. Her request to the authorities to pave a path was initially rejected as the path would have crossed under a row of windows, which presented a risk of killer litter, said Ms Chua. Eventually, there was a compromise – a new path was paved slightly further down, in line with the block's staircase landing instead of under windows. "It was so frustrating initially being able to see the bus from my void deck but being unable to run for it," she said. Mr Tan's and Ms Chua's struggles exemplify two of the biggest navigation issues that wayfinding consultant Samuel Lim sees in BTO flats today. "The first issue is that you can't see where you're going. The second is that you can see where you're going, but you can't get there," said Mr Lim, the founder of Studio Lucidus, a wayfinding consultancy. "These are friction points. Just having a few in one path is enough to frustrate people." CARPARK MAZES At Alkaff CourtView, completed in 2020, and Rivervale Shores, completed in 2023, housing blocks are situated around an underground carpark. The carpark offers access to the lift lobby of each block. Blocks are also connected via linkways. At both estates, some of the drop-off points are within the underground carpark. This can be confusing for visitors and private-hire drivers, say residents. Mr Shafiq, 38, a security manager who has been staying at Rivervale Shores for about four years said, "Some drivers don't even know that there is this section of the carpark back here. If you book a Grab, I think no Grab will come back here." Private-drivers have cancelled on him before or faced issues finding him, he said. To solve this, Mr Shafiq, whose block is a bit further in, often walks to a different block to wait for private hire rides. For Mr Syed, 46, a food delivery rider and Rivervale Shores resident, it's the complexity of the carpark that makes it hard to navigate despite the colour-coded pillars and signage. The carpark is "like a maze", he said, adding, "You see walls here and there. You can't see the signboard of the block." However, there are pros to this carpark design as well, according to Madam Chan, a 70-year-old retiree and Rivervale Shores resident. For Madam Chan, who moved to Rivervale Shores two years ago from her flat in Toa Payoh, it took "a few months" to get her bearings. But now, she's a fan of the carpark layout because it's fully sheltered. Over at Alkaff CourtView, it seems getting lost is common. In my first few minutes at the estate, I'd merely paused for a moment at a footpath when a resident assumed I'd lost my way. She even asked which block I was looking for and offered to show me to my destination. Ms Kwek, 34, a nurse, and Ms Yee, a 36-year-old teacher, who declined to give their full names, said they try to help lost strangers multiple times a week. Because blocks are situated around the underground carpark, it can be confusing to determine which block you're at, as well as where each block ends and the next begins, said Ms Kwek. Five years after she moved in, she and her family have gotten used to their usual routes such as going out to a nearby coffeeshop for food. But they still find it difficult to navigate the rest of the estate and in turn are unable to offer strangers advice. "If we were to meet any Grab drivers or any food delivery guys, and they ask, 'How do I go to this block?' Then we don't have a ready answer." Private-hire pick ups can be an ordeal sometimes, said Ms Yee. Sometimes, drivers end up in the carpark, but on the wrong level. "If you're a first timer here, you definitely will get lost." Ms Yee said she sees lost visitors on a daily basis, and tries to help them when she can. "I make it a point to bring them to their destination. If you tell them the directions, they also won't know." For Ms Annie Seah, a 72-year-old retiree, navigation isn't the issue. "Maybe I am more skillful with directions. I'm not the usual 'blur' old person," Ms Seah said brightly. However, she finds the increased privacy and more irregular void decks unsettling in a different way. "I don't see people around nowadays. Especially for an elderly person, it gets lonely." "There's no use of having wider corridors and more space outside our flats. Nobody uses it. In old HDB flats, we would even put folding tables in the common area and eat outside our flats." She lives on a lower floor which opens into a communal area that people hardly use, she said. With the pillars and walls around the space, however, she feels unsafe. "There's a wall outside my door. Sometimes I am scared that people might hide outside and attack me when I come out," said Ms Seah, who lives alone in a two-room senior flat. WHY HDB FLATS ARE THE WAY THAT THEY ARE Like it or hate it, it seems that the current BTO configuration is here to stay. But how did we get here? Over the decades, as the nation's priorities have shifted, so has housing design. Back in 1960, when the HDB was first established, solving Singapore's housing shortage was the priority. In its first five years, HDB built 53,000 flats. Building fast and keeping costs low were the main considerations. In an Instagram Reel released in May, HDB Principal Architect Xianghua Wu explained that the first flats, slab blocks, were "efficient to build and helped us move people out of slums and squatter settlements into proper housing". However, the quirk of slab blocks were the long corridors. Flats often had living room or bedroom windows looking out onto these corridors. After the slab block came the point block. Flats were placed on the four corners of every floor, eliminating the common corridor. This allowed for more privacy, as well as more natural light and ventilation in each unit. Blocks 160 and 161 at Mei Ling Street, which saw their first residents in 1970, were the first point blocks. Later on, HDB also built hybrid blocks like Rowell Court in Little India, which has elements of a slab block and a point block. Once the housing shortage in HDB's early days was solved, it began to experiment with the architecture of its flats, aiming to give communities more character. Distinctive examples include the brick-faced blocks at Tampines Street 45, as well as the blocks at Potong Pasir Ave 3 with distinctive slanted roofs. Fast forward to today, BTO estates of today, blocks are fabricated using advanced precast technology. The slab block method of construction has been done away with. As Mr Wu explained in the Reel: "Residents preferred more privacy and better views. So we redesigned each block using several stacks. Residents now have outward-facing bedroom windows, better ventilation and natural lighting, but the block shapes are less linear." -Insert HDB comments here on current BTO flat design - is it impossible to build a point block for smaller flat sizes? FINDING MIDDLE GROUND Tradeoffs are inescapable in housing. But do we really have to choose between privacy and an open, regular-shaped void deck? Several BTO flat residents CNA spoke to rejected the idea that it has to be one or the other, chiefly because they did not feel that their flats were particularly private. "In fact, we are living door to door," said Ms Yee, the Alkaff Courtview resident. "My neighbour's CCTV (Closed-Circuit Television) camera points right at my door." Ms Chua, the Ubi Grove resident, had the same view. "I don't think there is really even privacy with this flat design. To get to my unit, I pass by five units. And we are door to door." Some of her neighbours' service yards are also visible from the corridors, added Ms Chua. Then again, there are some, like Mr Soh, who are pleased with their flat layouts and aren't too fussed about the void deck configuration. Mr Soh, who lives in Tampines GreenOpal, explained his rationale. "You buy a flat, you live in the flat. You don't live in the void deck. Most of the time you are in your unit. How often do you need to manoeuvre across the void deck?" Still, there is some merit in bringing wayfinding into the picture much earlier on, said Mr Lim, the wayfinding consultant. It's not just housing. Wayfinding is often an afterthought in other spaces like malls and hospitals, said Mr Lim. "A lot of times, when we talk about wayfinding, clients jump straight to signage, colours and fonts. They're not wrong – those are important too. But I'm saying before we talk about those, there are a lot of things that we could have ironed out together." If wayfinders like him were consulted in the planning stage, before the space was even built, navigation kinks could easily be fixed at a lower cost, said Mr Lim. "It wouldn't cost much money because there's nothing for me to knock down. It would just be editing the plans and working with architects." Pointing to Ubi Groves' site plans, he said that the bus stop issue Ms Chua described was obvious to him. Had he been involved early on, he'd have suggested a more direct path from the get go, saving the residents the frustration of going back and forth with the authorities. To help residents navigate the more irregularly shaped void decks of today, newer BTO estates have more wayfinding signs, Mr Wu had said in HDB's Instagram Reel. But wayfinding encompasses more than just signs, Mr Lim emphasised. Wayfinding also looks at what's the quickest and most efficient way for users of a space to get somewhere and how it feels to navigate a space. "Blind spots create a lot of tension. They don't allow people to feel confident walking along the corridor. Adding signs may help, but how many twists and turns can you make people go through?" All this constitutes the experience of navigating a space, explained Mr Lim. "It's not even about whether people are clear or whether people can find their way. It's about how people feel when they walk around. That's what's always missing from the conversation in terms of wayfinding." Indeed, Mr Tan, the Tampines GreenOpal resident said that navigating his void deck has been a daily source of vexation. "When you come back home, you don't want to feel like you're coming back to darkness … The corners are sharp, the corridors are narrow. It feels very restrictive and hard to breathe. When you come back from work, you just want to feel relaxed. But coming back to this is just basically not it." Despite the daily frictions, however, most of the residents CNA spoke to affirmed that they would likely be staying put in their estates for the time being. Residents also shared ideas on how to make navigating their estates a little easier. Mr Tan's wish list includes more blind spot mirrors in the void deck. Ms Chua also suggested more signage to indicate the way out of each void deck, as well as paving desire paths that have naturally occurred. "And if they want to build a desire path, why not build a shelter along the path as well?" added Ms Chua. "It will protect residents from killer litter, right?" For now, at least, it seems like this middle ground of making small improvements to new void deck layouts will have to suffice. "In life, you get used to things," said Mr Soh, who has come to enjoy taking walks around Tampines GreenOpal, even if he occasionally gets lost. "They say, when life gives you lemons, you make lemonade."