Mount Faber
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English | Mount Faber |
Chinese | 花柏山 |
(Pinyin | Hūabò shān) |
Malay | fill in |
Tamil | fill in |
Mount Faber, formerly known as Telok Blangah Hill, is a hill about 106 metres in height in Singapore, located near the Bukit Merah planning area in the Central Region. It overlooks the Telok Blangah area, and the western parts of the Central Area. The summit is accessible by road, but there are many footpaths leading up the hill.
It is a frequent tourist destination, as it provides a panoramic view of the increasingly dense central business district within the Central Area. Its slope includes a tower that is part of the Singapore cable car system that connects to HarbourFront and Sentosa. It is accessible from the HarbourFront MRT Station.
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[edit] History
Mount Faber was known as Telok Blangah Hill but was later renamed after Captain Charles Edward Faber of the Madras Engineers, the superintending engineer in the Straits and Governor Butterworth's brother-in-law, who arrived in Singapore in September 1844. Faber cut through the thick undergrowth, allowing the road to the top of the hill to be built. The original winding road was referred to in the press at that time as a "stupidly narrow word".
The article also questioned the change of the name from what it deemed its originally more appropriate Malay name. A signal station was erected on the hill in 1845, and the Malay used to refer to the hill as Bukit Bendara (Flag Hill). This signal station was transferred from Pulau Blakang Mati (now Sentosa) because of the "injurious miasma" on the island.
After the Indian Mutiny of 1857, the Straits government decided to convert Mount Faber into a fort for fear of revolt among the local Indian sepoys. Defence work was carried out and granite emplacements for guns were completed halfway up the hill, but Mount Faber never became a fort. An observatory was built there in 1905.
[edit] Geography
The vegetation around Mount Faber is secondary rainforest that is smaller and less dense than on Bukit Timah Hill. Mount Faber is one of the higher hills in Singapore at 106 metres, behind the Bukit Timah Hill (164 m) and Bukit Gombak (133 m and 113 m). It is separated from the adjacent slightly lower Telok Blangah Hill by Henderson Road.
[edit] References
- Victor R Savage, Brenda S A Yeoh (2003), Toponymics - A Study of Singapore Street Names, Eastern Universities Press, ISBN 981-210-205-1