The jade hills
The name comes from the Kwong Wai Siew Peck San Theng cemetery, founded in 1870 for Cantonese and Hakka immigrants — “pavilions on the jade hills”, whose pavilions later inspired the pitched roofs of Bishan’s HDB blocks. By the 1970s it was the largest Chinese cemetery in Singapore; burials stopped in 1973, the land was acquired in 1979, and exhumation ran from 1982 to 1984.
Private housing came first: the 1950s brought estates such as Thomson Rise, Coral Park and Clover Park. The HDB new town followed between 1983 and 1989. Bishan MRT opened in 1987, first named San Teng, and became a Circle Line interchange in 2009; Bishan–Ang Mo Kio Park, opened in 1988, was naturalised between 2009 and 2012.
What the planning area covers
Its subzones are Bishan East, Marymount and Upper Thomson — so the condominiums of Sin Ming and Upper Thomson Road are Bishan, while Thomson’s southern end is in Novena.
New launches and land sales
- Thomson Reserve — UOL and CapitaLand Development, 1,268 homes on the former Thomson View site at Bright Hill Drive, planned for launch in the fourth quarter of 2026.
- Lorong Puntong / Sin Ming Avenue site — about 140 homes, awarded by URA on 18 September 2026 to Eco World Development (S), 99-year lease.
Getting around
Four stations sit inside the boundary: Bishan, the North–South and Circle interchange; Marymount on the Circle Line; and Bright Hill and Upper Thomson on the Thomson–East Coast Line. Bright Hill becomes an interchange when the Cross Island Line’s first phase opens, which LTA expects by 2030.
Schools with pages here include Ai Tong School, Catholic High School and Kuo Chuan Presbyterian Primary.
Who manages the buildings here
Smart Property Management (5), Landsfield (4) manage the most developments inside the boundary. Nearly a quarter of the developments here have no managing agent on record — many are small blocks run by their own council. Each building page lists its own office contact.
What to have ready
The management office will ask for the MCST number and your unit. Public carparks with live lot counts are on the carparks page; see also the District 20 page.
Sources: URA Master Plan 2019 planning area and subzone boundaries (data.gov.sg); NLB Infopedia (Bishan); EdgeProp (Thomson Reserve); URA (Lorong Puntong award); LTA (Cross Island Line). Buildings are listed when their coordinate falls inside URA’s boundary for the planning area; prices are left out because they change.
