Two sports groups, Netball Singapore and the Singapore Squash Rackets Association, will have to move out of their homes in Kallang. The government is planning to build new facilities in their place.
The upcoming changes are part of the government’s plan to revitalize the Kallang River over the next 20 years. However, netball and squash are not among them.
A section for young people will be built in the area where netball and squash are now played. It will have a velodrome for cycling and a speed climbing wall.
Netball Singapore is working hard to find a new home for the Kallang Netball Centre. The center has six outdoor courts and has been the central place for many leagues and recreational netball games.
Netball Singapore said it tried one last time to stay in Kallang, the center of Singapore’s sports scene. “We would have loved to be a part of the overall plans,” said the president of Netball Singapore, Ms. Jessica Tan.
“This place is important to us. We have left a mark on this place.” Ms. Tan said that Netball Singapore is working with the government agency SportSG to try to stay, but that plans have already been made for a new place.
“To be fair, SportSG did listen to us. We hope they’ll change their minds about what they want to do. But at the same time, they have told us what their plans are for the new location,” she said.
The following year, Netball Singapore could move to Toa Payoh. There could be six courts, some of which could be inside.
For the past 50 years, the Kallang Squash Centre has been in the Singapore Sports Hub. It was supposed to be torn down by this year so that new plans could be made.
But because there is a new threat of plague called COVID-19, that date has been moved back. Squash Singapore has yet to find a new place to move and is still trying to please the government.
The president of Singapore Squash, Mr. Patrick Thio, said, “We’re asking the government to look at what we are doing for the last 2 years and decide if it’s enough to give us a new place to meet instead of the Kallang Squash Centre.”
“I hope that the government will see from all the things we’ve done over the last two years that we’re working hard, and that we’re meeting their standards for us.” After Kallang’s seven courts are taken down, Singapore will have less than 20 public squash courts.
Mr. Thio has given SportSG plans for a S$20 million renovation of the current center, which will turn it into a world-class facility in a small space of 45 by 45 square meters spread over three floors.
He said that this will help both the local squash scene and the international squash scene. “Kallang is known to the rest of the world,” Mr. Thio said. “[Kallang] has been there to train or play before, and they have fond memories of Kallang Squash Centre.”
Mr. Thio said that SportSG and the Ministry of Culture, Community, and Youth had yet to get back to him.
Even though the Kallang Lawn Bowl’s rinks have been re-turfed, no one knows what will happen to them. There are currently 19 sports groups in the Kallang area. Some of these groups are for cycling, ice skating, and archery.
SportSG will own and run new facilities for all these sports groups as part of the Kallang Alive project. They include the Kallang Football Hub, the national training center for football, and the Kallang Tennis Center, the national training center for tennis.
SportSG told CNA that it works closely with National Sports Associations, such as those for netball and squash, to ensure that Team Singapore athletes have good facilities all over the country.
It said that it would continue to evaluate and review plans for Kallang Alive to make sure that all land uses are the best they can be. SportSG said planned changes to Kallang Alive are on track and will be finished in stages over the next few years.
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