Integrated Resort in the Central Business District of Singapore: The Land Use Planning and Sustainability Issues

Placing land use planning in the same basket with sustainable development is a relatively new issue in the domain of modern urban development. Sustainability planning, if it is to be perceived as a new agenda of planning, has yet to overcome hurdles put forward by politicians, economists and the general public (see Wheeler 2004: 32). By the very nature of planning, whether in terms of land use, economic, social or environmental, its purpose is to achieve in a systematic and organized approach the set medium- or long-term objectives and goals. Land use planning therefore is an instrument per se or an organized profession for those practicing it that would have to adapt to changing circumstances associated with the set goals. For example, when sustainable urban development is a set goal that aims to achieve an environmentally pleasant city, the planning criteria deployed would then be based on a “visionary garden city”. Logically, in the real world, as decision-makers’ priorities change from one stage to another, land use planners are often in no position to undertake a holistic approach to planning of the urban environment. In practice, they habitually have to ignore the realities of political and economic power that have effected land use change, and have to facilitate its change orientated towards those set by decision-makers for one reason or another.