New office cum retail development with public garden to open in the CBD in Q3 2023

SINGAPORE – The Central Business District (CBD) will get a new public garden in the third quarter of 2023, when IOI Central Boulevard Towers, a mixed-use development, is opened.

The garden, called Central Green and located at the complex’s seventh floor, will be 160m long and have a 200m round jogging track, as well as two viewing decks overlooking the building’s surroundings, which include Lau Pa Sat, a hawker centre with a long history in the CBD.

Developer IOI Properties Group told The Straits Times that it aims to make the 120,000 sq ft space – equivalent in size to about 1½ football fields – “as public as possible”, adding that its standard opening hours will be determined later, based on future demand and usage.

The new development’s opening date has also not been fixed, said IOI, which added that Central Green will also have a restaurant and a cafe. The complex – located at the intersection of Central Boulevard and Raffles Quay – will also include a childcare facility.

On the complex’s first floor, cyclists can utilise more than 300 bicycle parking spaces, of which 177 will be set aside for building tenants and 150 for the public. There will also be end-of-trip facilities such as shower rooms and lockers.

The developer added that with the building’s opening, connectivity around the CBD for pedestrians will be improved, especially by two bridges that will link the new complex to One Raffles Quay and Asia Square.

IOI Central Boulevard Towers will be directly linked to Downtown MRT station, while other MRT stations such as Raffles Place, Shenton Way and Marina Bay can also be reached from the building via fully sheltered routes.

The development’s 16- and 48-storey towers, as well as a seven-floor podium, will include about 1.26 million sq ft of office space and 30,000 sq ft of retail and food and beverage space. IOI said about 30 per cent of the office space has been filled, adding that discussions with other prospective tenants are under way.

It was previously reported that Amazon has signed a lease for about 369,000 sq ft of office space in the towers, and IOI said information on other tenants will be provided only at a later point.

Meanwhile, the developer said there has been “significant interest” in the building’s retail space, and that it is “in the phase of firming up our retail market positioning”, before making commitments to retailers.

JLL’s head of research and consultancy for Singapore Tay Huey Ying said the completion of IOI Central Boulevard Towers is a “welcomed reprieve for occupiers with large space requirements in a market facing a tight vacancy rate”.

Demand for Grade A office space in the CBD staged a strong turnaround in 2022, she said, with the vacancy rate for such spaces – based on JLL’s estimates – at 5.5 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2022, down from 9.6 per cent in the third quarter of 2021.

While there is no fixed industry definition for Grade A office space, it is generally expected to be in locations with good connectivity and large, column-free floor plates, among other qualities.

A post-pandemic rush by companies to provide their returning employees with workplaces that emphasise health and well-being has driven demand for newer and better quality office developments in the CBD, driving rents for Grade A office spaces up, said Ms Tay.

Meanwhile, CBRE head of research for South-east Asia Tricia Song expects leasing momentum for IOI Central Boulevard Towers to pick up closer to its completion date. Ms Song said that even though demand for office space from the tech sector has cooled, CBRE has received a steady stream of inquiries for vacancies from firms in other sectors, such as banking and finance.

She noted that IOI Central Boulevard Towers will be the only new development in the core CBD and Marina Bay areas in the coming years, which will likely add to demand for the complex’s office space.

“Good quality prime office space in CBD will be very limited and hard to come by, as new office sites are slated to be outside CBD.”

This article was first published in The Business Times on Feb 6, 2023