The MRT Concourse as Anchor Point
Singapore's underground pedestrian network is anchored around its Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) station concourses. The concourse level — typically 10 to 20 metres below street grade — functions as more than a ticketing and fare gate zone. At major interchange stations, it is a pedestrian node connecting multiple exit points, underground retail corridors, and direct basement links to adjacent developments.
Raffles Place MRT station, opened in 1987, remains the most connected underground node in the city. Its four exits — labelled A through D — each connect to adjacent commercial building basements. Exit A links to OUE Bayfront and the Arcade retail complex; Exit B connects to One Raffles Place; Exit C opens to Raffles Place Park and provides a street-level egress; Exit D links to Change Alley and the Standard Chartered Bank buildings. From each of these basement connections, further underground corridors extend to neighbouring towers, creating a walking zone that stretches, with some navigational effort, from Shenton Way in the south to Fullerton Bay in the east.
City Hall and the Civic District
City Hall MRT station, now part of the East-West and North-South interchange at City Hall / Raffles City, provides underground connections to Raffles City Shopping Centre and the Swissôtel The Stamford complex. The basement connection was incorporated into the original Raffles City development brief in the early 1980s, making it one of Singapore's earliest examples of a planned underground pedestrian link between a transit node and a private development.
Since then, the Urban Redevelopment Authority has progressively formalised requirements for underground connections in the Downtown Core planning area. New commercial developments above a defined gross floor area threshold that fall within 200 metres of an MRT station exit are now required by their planning conditions to provide a direct or linkable basement connection to the nearest exit. The specifications for these connections — minimum width 3.0 metres, minimum headroom 2.4 metres, 24-hour accessibility for a designated portion of the route — are documented in URA's development guide plans.
Marina Bay and the Next Generation Underground
The Marina Bay Financial Centre (MBFC) precinct, developed between 2008 and 2013, was planned from the outset with an integrated underground pedestrian network. The three towers — Tower 1, Tower 2, and Tower 3 — share a common basement podium that connects directly to Marina Bay MRT station (Circle Line) and, via a dedicated underground walkway, to the Downtown MRT station (Downtown Line) opened in 2013.
The MBFC underground walkway to Downtown station is approximately 280 metres long and represents one of the longer purpose-built underground pedestrian connections in Singapore. It is air-conditioned, lit to 150 lux — significantly above the 50 lux minimum for LTA-managed covered walkways above ground — and includes a moving walkway section for the steeper gradient transition between the MBFC podium level and the station concourse.
The Marina Bay Sands integrated resort, opened in 2010, adds a further layer to the underground network. Its basement level connects to a pedestrian underpass beneath Bayfront Avenue, providing a grade-separated link to the waterfront promenade and the ArtScience Museum complex without crossing at surface level. This underpass also connects to Bayfront MRT station, which sits beneath the junction of Marina Boulevard and Bayfront Avenue.
Mapping the Network: Gaps and Continuities
Despite the density of underground connections in the Marina Bay and Raffles Place districts, the network has well-documented gaps. The stretch between Tanjong Pagar MRT station and the cluster of office towers along Anson Road remains predominantly above ground. Several towers along Robinson Road — completed in the 1990s before underground link requirements became standard — do not have basement connections to adjacent buildings or to the nearest MRT exits.
The Land Transport Authority and URA have published a Downtown Core Underground Pedestrian Network masterplan, updated in 2023, which identifies 17 gap sections where underground connections are planned over the next decade. Five of these involve new MRT station exits being constructed as part of the Cross Island Line works passing through the CBD. The remaining 12 are triggered by redevelopment of existing buildings, at which point underground connection obligations become active as part of the planning permission process.
Wayfinding Below Grade
Navigating Singapore's underground pedestrian network without prior knowledge is notoriously difficult. Unlike Hong Kong's MTR concourse maps, which display the full above- and below-ground pedestrian network at each station, Singapore's MRT station maps show only station-owned spaces and direct connections. Private basement corridors — even where they are publicly accessible — do not appear on LTA's published signage.
This has been a consistent criticism from urban mobility researchers and foreign visitors. A 2022 study by the Centre for Liveable Cities found that only 34 percent of first-time users of the Raffles Place underground network successfully completed a planned route without surfacing at least once, despite the route being physically possible to complete underground. The study recommended an integrated wayfinding scheme using floor-level directional markings and QR-linked digital maps — recommendations that LTA acknowledged but had not fully implemented as of 2026.
Below Ground Beyond the CBD
Underground pedestrian connections are not exclusive to the CBD, though they are most extensive there. Jurong East MRT interchange station has a significant underground concourse connecting to Westgate and JEM shopping centres, replicating the CBD model in Singapore's western commercial hub. Tampines and Bugis interchanges have similar, if smaller, basement link arrangements with adjacent retail complexes.
The Woodlands Regional Centre — designated as a major commercial node in URA's Master Plan — has had underground pedestrian links incorporated into its development framework since the 2019 revision. As Woodlands develops through the 2020s and 2030s, its underground network is expected to mirror the Marina Bay model, with mandatory basement connections linking office, hotel, and retail developments to the Woodlands MRT station concourse.