Jalan Besar is the name of a street

Street

A street is a paved public thoroughfare in a built environment. It is a public parcel of land adjoining buildings in an urban context, on which people may freely assemble, interact, and move about. A street can be as simple as a level patch of dirt, but is more often paved with a hard, durable...

 in the northeastern part of the Central Area

Central Area

In Singapore, the Central Area or Central Business District contains the core financial and commercial districts, including eleven urban planning areas, namely Downtown Core, Marina East, Marina South, Museum, Newton, Orchard, Outram, River Valley, Rochor, Singapore River and Straits View as...

 in Singapore

Singapore

Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

, which is its central business district

Central business district

A central business district is the commercial and often geographic heart of a city. In North America this part of a city is commonly referred to as "downtown" or "city center"...

. It is also the name of the electoral Jalan Basar Group Representation Constituency, of which Jalan Basar is a prominent centrepiece. The street itself falls under the Kallang

Kallang

Kallang is an urban planning area and a subdivision located in the southeastern part of Singapore.It is probably best known for being the location of the Singapore Indoor Stadium & the old National Stadium, as well as the new Singapore Sports Hub...

 urban planning area in the context of the Urban Redevelopment Authority

Urban Redevelopment Authority

The Urban Redevelopment Authority is the national urban planning authority of Singapore, and a statutory board under the Ministry of National Development of the Singapore Government.-Mission:The authority was established on 1 April 1974, and is of especially critical importance to the city-state,...

, although Kallang itself politically falls under the Jalan Basar Group Representative Constituency.

Etymology and history

Jalan Besar only appeared in the 1880s, when the Municipality

Municipality

A municipality is essentially an urban administrative division having corporate status and usually powers of self-government. It can also be used to mean the governing body of a municipality. A municipality is a general-purpose administrative subdivision, as opposed to a special-purpose district...

 constructed it through nipah land and called it Jalan Besar, meaning "big or wide road" in Malay

Malay language

Malay is a major language of the Austronesian family. It is the official language of Malaysia , Indonesia , Brunei and Singapore...

.

The area belonged to Richard Owen Norris from the 1830s to 1865, before he moved to Paya Lebar

Paya Lebar

Paya Lebar is an area in the north-eastern part of Singapore. It is served by Paya Lebar Station, on the East West Line of Singapore's Mass Rapid Transit system. It is an urban planning area. The Singapore Post Centre is located there too....

. Later, Syed Allie (1814-1858) bought 70 acre

Acre

The acre is a unit of area in a number of different systems, including the imperial and U.S. customary systems. The most commonly used acres today are the international acre and, in the United States, the survey acre. The most common use of the acre is to measure tracts of land.The acre is related...

s of land in this area and filled in what was predominantly swamp

Swamp

A swamp is a wetland with some flooding of large areas of land by shallow bodies of water. A swamp generally has a large number of hammocks, or dry-land protrusions, covered by aquatic vegetation, or vegetation that tolerates periodical inundation. The two main types of swamp are "true" or swamp...

 land.

The site where Beatty School was and the HDB flats

Apartment

An apartment or flat is a self-contained housing unit that occupies only part of a building...

 are was a big expanse of open ground. A rubber

Rubber

Natural rubber, also called India rubber or caoutchouc, is an elastomer that was originally derived from latex, a milky colloid produced by some plants. The plants would be ‘tapped’, that is, an incision made into the bark of the tree and the sticky, milk colored latex sap collected and refined...

 factory stood on the field, and another in Kitchener Road. The place was full of snipe

Snipe

A snipe is any of about 25 wading bird species in three genera in the family Scolopacidae. They are characterized by a very long, slender bill and crypsis plumage. The Gallinago snipes have a nearly worldwide distribution, the Lymnocryptes Jack Snipe is restricted to Asia and Europe and the...

s and a favourite haunt of hunters.

The other side of Jalan Besar between Lavender Street and Syed Alwi Road was swamp land. Flying duck

Duck

Duck is the common name for a large number of species in the Anatidae family of birds, which also includes swans and geese. The ducks are divided among several subfamilies in the Anatidae family; they do not represent a monophyletic group but a form taxon, since swans and geese are not considered...

s, snipe, fish

Fish

Fish are a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic vertebrate animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as various extinct related groups...

, mud lobsters and multi-coloured snake

Snake

Snakes are elongate, legless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes that can be distinguished from legless lizards by their lack of eyelids and external ears. Like all squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales...

s thrived there. The area was slowly reclaimed by dumping refuse. In 1923, the New World Amusement Park

New World Amusement Park

The New World Amusement Park was the first of three amusement parks, along with Great World and Gay World , that wooed Malaya and Singapore night crowds from the 1920s to the 1960s. New World was a prominent landmark in Jalan Besar, as it occupied a large area of in size...

 located off Jalan Besar was opened by the enterprising sons of Ong Sam Leong (after whom nearby Sam Leong Road is named), Peng Hock and Boon Tat.

A peculiarity of the street names in Jalan Besar is that many bear the names of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

 British

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was the formal name of the United Kingdom during the period when what is now the Republic of Ireland formed a part of it....

 general

General

A general officer is an officer of high military rank, usually in the army, and in some nations, the air force. The term is widely used by many nations of the world, and when a country uses a different term, there is an equivalent title given....

s and admirals and two French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 generals — Allenby

Edmund Allenby, 1st Viscount Allenby

Field Marshal Edmund Henry Hynman Allenby, 1st Viscount Allenby GCB, GCMG, GCVO was a British soldier and administrator most famous for his role during the First World War, in which he led the Egyptian Expeditionary Force in the conquest of Palestine and Syria in 1917 and 1918.Allenby, nicknamed...

, Kitchener, French

John French, 1st Earl of Ypres

Field Marshal John Denton Pinkstone French, 1st Earl of Ypres, KP, GCB, OM, GCVO, KCMG, ADC, PC , known as The Viscount French between 1916 and 1922, was a British and Anglo-Irish officer...

, Maude

Frederick Stanley Maude

Lieutenant General Sir Frederick Stanley Maude KCB, CMG, DSO was a British commander, most famous for his efforts in Mesopotamia during World War I and for conquering Baghdad in 1917.-Family:...

, Jellicoe

John Jellicoe, 1st Earl Jellicoe

Admiral of the Fleet John Rushworth Jellicoe, 1st Earl Jellicoe, GCB, OM, GCVO was a British Royal Navy admiral who commanded the Grand Fleet at the Battle of Jutland in World War I...

, Tyrwhitt

Reginald Tyrwhitt

Admiral of the Fleet Sir Reginald Yorke Tyrwhitt, 1st Baronet, GCB, DSO was a senior officer of the Royal Navy in World War I who commanded light forces stationed at Harwich on the east coast of England during the first part of the war.-Naval career:Tyrwhitt entered the Navy as a cadet in July, 1885...

, Foch

Ferdinand Foch

Ferdinand Foch , GCB, OM, DSO was a French soldier, war hero, military theorist, and writer credited with possessing "the most original and subtle mind in the French army" in the early 20th century. He served as general in the French army during World War I and was made Marshal of France in its...

, Sturdee

Doveton Sturdee

Admiral of the Fleet Sir Frederick Charles Doveton Sturdee, 1st Baronet, GCB, KCMG, CVO was a British admiral.-Naval career:...

, Beatty

David Beatty, 1st Earl Beatty

Admiral of the Fleet David Richard Beatty, 1st Earl Beatty, GCB, OM, GCVO, DSO was an admiral in the Royal Navy...

 and Petain

Philippe Pétain

Henri Philippe Benoni Omer Joseph Pétain , generally known as Philippe Pétain or Marshal Pétain , was a French general who reached the distinction of Marshal of France, and was later Chief of State of Vichy France , from 1940 to 1944...

. The names of battle places such as Flanders

Flanders

Flanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France and the Netherlands. "Flanders" can also refer to the northern part of Belgium that contains Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp...

, Somme

Somme

Somme is a department of France, located in the north of the country and named after the Somme river. It is part of the Picardy region of France....

 and Verdon

Verdon

-Several places in the United States:*Verdon Township, Aitkin County, Minnesota*Verdon, Nebraska*Verdon, South Dakota-Name or part of the name of several communes in France:* Verdon, in the Dordogne département* Verdon, in the Marne département...

 are also reflected. Today, Jalan Besar is a gazette

Gazette

A gazette is a public journal, a newspaper of record, or simply a newspaper.In English- and French-speaking countries, newspaper publishers have applied the name Gazette since the 17th century; today, numerous weekly and daily newspapers bear the name The Gazette.Gazette is a loanword from the...

d conservation

Architectural conservation

Architectural conservation describes the process through which the material, historical, and design integrity of mankind's built heritage are prolonged through carefully planned interventions. The individual engaged in this pursuit is known as an architectural conservator...

 area.

Most of the roads above were cut from the 1920s onwards when the then-swampland was filled in with incinerator ash from Singapore

Singapore

Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

's first incinerator built in the vicinity of today's Syed Alwi Road. From 1926, the Municipal Council decided to name the newly-opened roads after personalities and battle-sites of the European conflict so as to remind the then-colony of Singapore of the conflicts in Europe.

The street is known to the Hoklos (Hokkien) as kam kong ka poh thai tu long, which means "the slaughter pig depot in Kampong Kapor", a reference to the abattoir in the vicinity.

Other uses

"Jalan Besar" is also a common street name in Malaysia used as an occasional substitute for the colonially named "Main Street" and "Main Road", as part of the country's increased use of Malay

Malay language

Malay is a major language of the Austronesian family. It is the official language of Malaysia , Indonesia , Brunei and Singapore...

over English. The name is prevalent in individual towns that formerly featured their own set of street names representing main thoroughfares and streets related to specific landmarks.