Smith Street Blk 335, the building everyone still calls 牛车水大厦, is shut on Monday 16 November and Tuesday 17 November 2026. That is the National Environment Agency's Q4 washing window for Chinatown Complex Market, published on data.gov.sg as 16/11/2026 to 17/11/2026. The whole centre is closed. Wet market, dry goods, cooked-food floor, drinks. Do not walk from Chinatown MRT Exit A expecting claypot rice.
NEA's row for this building lists 226 cooked-food stalls and 477 market stalls. That is still the largest hawker centre in Singapore by stall count. It opened in 1983 to pull street hawkers off Smith, Pagoda, Trengganu, Temple and Sago. Locals still buy fish in the basement from about 7am and eat upstairs. Tourists queue the same tables. Two closed days is a small inconvenience next to a three-month repair, but it is real. If your Saturday grocery run is this building, move it to Friday 14 November or Wednesday 18 November.
This is washing, not the delayed renovation
Do not mix this notice with the 2026 repair-and-redecoration talk. Chinatown Complex Hawker Association told CNA in 2025 that a larger works package was planned for March 2026. By January 2026, 8world reported the association saying the job had slipped, with hawkers pushing for a 2027 low season rather than a Q4 2026 start. The Q4 dates on data.gov.sg are ordinary quarterly cleaning, the same class of closure as 22 to 23 June and 31 August to 1 September this year. The NEA announcements page still points the public at that dataset for hawker-centre and market closures. Lookup.sg, which refreshes from the same NEA schedule, lists Chinatown Complex Market as closed Monday 16 November to Tuesday 17 November for cleaning.
During a scheduled cleaning closure the whole centre is closed, including drink stalls. After it reopens, individual stalls still keep their own rest days. A stall that is dark on Wednesday in a normal week will still be dark on Wednesday 18 November. Check the stall, not only the building.
Where to eat those two days
Maxwell Food Centre at 1 Kadayanallur Street is open on 16 and 17 November. Its Q4 washing date in the same NEA table is 14 December 2026, one day only. Maxwell MRT Exit 2 is closer than Chinatown MRT if you are already on the Thomson-East Coast Line. Tian Tian will have a queue. That is normal. China Street Hum Jin Pang is gone as of August 2026, so do not hunt for $1 fritters.
People's Park Food Centre at Blk 32 New Market Road, the ground-floor hawker under People's Park Complex, has its Q4 wash on 7 and 8 December. Amoy Street Food Centre, 134 cooked-food stalls in the CBD annex, is listed for 12 and 13 December. Kukoh 21 Food Centre on the west edge of the precinct is listed for 30 November. All four of those are open while Smith Street Blk 335 is being washed. If you live in Kreta Ayer and you only wanted vegetables, the wet market at Chinatown Complex is the one that actually shuts. Plan the fish for another morning.
The 2027 renovation, if it happens in the window hawkers asked for, will be a different article. That job is about lifts, lighting, exhaust, and a possible central dishwashing area on the second floor. A two-day wash does not fix those. It just means you do not eat here on those two weekdays.
Practical details
- Dates: Monday 16 November and Tuesday 17 November 2026
- What closes: Whole of Chinatown Complex Market and Food Centre, including cooked food, wet market, and drinks
- Venue: Smith Street Blk 335 (Chinatown Complex), 335 Smith Street, Singapore 050335
- Nearest MRT: Chinatown (NE4/DT19), about a 3-minute walk
- Reopens: Wednesday 18 November 2026, stall rest days still apply
- Open nearby those days: Maxwell Food Centre (Q4 wash 14 December), People's Park Food Centre (7 to 8 December), Amoy Street Food Centre (12 to 13 December)
- Official schedule: NEA Dates of Hawker Centres Closure on data.gov.sg
- NEA hawker page: Hawker Management announcements