Many more also find Singapore to be a vibrant and exciting city with its own distinctive character. -- ST PHOTO: CHEW SENG KIM
SINGAPORE is a great place to live, work and play in.
Nearly 84 per cent of 4,000 residents here gave the thumbs up to the city state in a lifestyle survey carried out by the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) from August 2009 to March this year - a 10.2 per cent jump from the survey carried out in 2006.
Many more - 78 per cent - also find Singapore to be a vibrant and exciting city with its own distinctive character, an increase of 11.4 per cent from 2006.
Specifically, more than 90 per cent the respondents said that they were satisfied with the living environment, over 85 per cent were satisfied with the working environment and over 80 per cent were satisfied with the leisure offerings in Singapore.
The remaking of Singapore has also not gone unnoticed by foreigners. Over 85 per cent felt that Singapore was a great place to live, work and play in, and 81 per cent of them agreed that it has its own distinctive character.
National Development Minister Mah Bow Tan highlighted these key survey findings when he spoke at the URA corporate plan seminar on Friday morning.
Describing the survey results as 'encouraging', Mr Mah said what heartened him more is that Singaporeans identify more with the country.
He noted that close to 90 per cent of the respondents say that Singapore is their home and where they belong. - 20 per cent more from the last survey. And more than 70 per cent want to retire in Singapore. Similarly, over 70 per cent of them hope that their future generations will be based in Singapore.
Mr Mah said the survey showed that the remaking of Singapore efforts are showing a positive trend - that Singaporeans love their city more.
He told the seminar: 'With more Singaporeans travelling round the world and working across borders, Singapore must still mean something special, as home, to our people. A house is not a home. Simply having a good living environment and first world infrastructure will not create an endearing home.
'The character of a city, what makes it stand out among many new cities, goes beyond new buildings or iconic structures. Take Times Square, New York and West End, London for example. Their claim to fame is not based on the latest or best infrastructure, but they are distinctive in character and have established a personality of their own in peoples' minds.
'Therefore, while we congratulate ourselves for our achievements, we need also to remind ourselves that the work does not stop here. More needs to be done. With our new hardware in place, we need to look beyond the physical, to search for the 'soul' of our city, and work towards enhancing it. '
