In Singapore, the planning and approval process for new buildings is very efficient. Well, Singapore Govt is generally very efficient.
It is not the same elsewhere in the world. One example on the other extreme would be the UK.
For this reason, new-builds in UK are in very short supply. Planning permission is granted by local authorities and they are all elected politicians. Generally, the UK people do not like tall buildings.
Read more in this blog post -
http://londonproperty123.blogspot.sg...ngaporean.html