Simpang Lima Square

Simpang Lima was born from presidential anger. In the 1960s, the original city square sat near the Kauman Grand Mosque, adjacent to Pasar Johar market. Local authorities transferred management of that land to private interests. The mosque's minaret was demolished. Religious scholars protested. When President Soekarno learned of this, he instructed the construction of a new public square to replace what had been lost. The site chosen was a swampy area at the southern edge of the old city center, where water spinach and amaranth once grew in shallow pools. Construction lasted from 1965 to 1969. The result was Lapangan Pancasila, a 3.3-hectare field at the junction of five roads: Jalan Pahlawan, Jalan Pandanaran, Jalan Ahmad Yani, Jalan Gajah Mada, and Jalan KH Ahmad Dahlan.

The square was meant to serve as a public gathering space, a replacement for the alun-alun that Indonesian cities have maintained since the pre-colonial era. Soekarno envisioned a space where citizens could congregate, exercise, celebrate holidays, and participate in civic life. The Baiturrahman Mosque opened at the square's northern edge in 1974. SMK Negeri 7, a vocational high school, was inaugurated by President Soeharto in 1971 at the square's periphery.

Within a decade of its completion, commercial development began encroaching on the area. Simpang Lima Superbazaar opened in 1978. Gajahmada Plaza followed in the early 1980s. Plaza Simpang Lima, a ten-story mall, opened in 1990 on land that had previously housed the Central Java Department of Tourism, Post, and Telecommunications office and a civic hall called Wisma Pancasila. Mall Ciputra opened in 1993 on land that had been occupied by a sports arena. The buildings Soekarno had suggested for civic purposes were replaced, one by one, with retail complexes.

R. Siti Rukayah, a researcher at Diponegoro University who has studied urban transformation in Semarang, documented this shift in a 2024 paper examining spatial contestation at Simpang Lima from 1975 to 2000. The study applied Henri Lefebvre's theory of the production of space to analyze the struggle between government, private investors, and residents over who controls the area. "Initially designed as a public space for social and cultural activities, Simpang Lima experienced a struggle for space involving the government, private sector, and the community," Rukayah wrote. Public facilities such as sports arenas and meeting halls were replaced with commercial buildings. The informal sector emerged in response.

By the 1980s, street vendors had begun setting up stalls along the field's edges in the evenings. They sold grilled corn, chicken rice, pecel, meatballs, and tahu gimbal—a Semarang specialty consisting of fried tofu, rice cake, cabbage, bean sprouts, shrimp fritters, and peanut sauce. The vendors occupied the same space that had been designated for public use, creating an informal economy that operated parallel to the formal retail structures rising around them.

The relationship between the malls and the street vendors is not one of opposition. Visitors to Simpang Lima often move between both. Crowds gather in the evenings, wandering past shop windows displaying goods that remain beyond the reach of many, as Lonely Planet's guidebook notes, though this does not diminish enthusiasm for the bright lights. After window shopping, the same visitors sit on plastic stools at the edge of the field, eating tahu gimbal from vendors who have worked the same spot for decades.

The square hosts the weekly car-free day every Sunday morning, when the surrounding streets are closed to vehicles and residents walk, jog, and cycle around the field. During New Year's Eve, fireworks displays draw tens of thousands. Political rallies have filled the space. Religious celebrations, particularly Eid prayers organized by the Baiturrahman Mosque, extend across the field and onto the surrounding streets.

Tio, the historian, has watched these changes with mixed feelings. He grew up in Semarang, left, and returned to find the city transformed. The rice paddies along Jalan Pahlawan are gone. The vegetable gardens in Pekunden have been built over. The swamp that became Simpang Lima is now surrounded by structures reaching nine, ten, eleven floors into the sky. "I was personally shocked by how enormous the changes in Semarang have been," he said. "What stands out is the appearance of skyscrapers." He finds some consolation in the areas that have been preserved—Kota Lama, the old Dutch colonial district; the Chinatown area around Sam Poo Kong temple; the Kampung Melayu neighborhood where Arab, Javanese, and Chinese communities have lived alongside one another for generations.

The contest over Simpang Lima's identity continues. A 2005 pedestrian bridge connecting Plaza Simpang Lima and Mall Ciputra created an elevated corridor for shoppers above the street-level activity. In 2022, Hotel Ibis Styles opened in a building that had previously housed a Ramayana department store and then an Ace Hardware outlet. The retail spaces cycle through tenants. Meanwhile, the field itself remains, a grassy rectangle surrounded by commerce, filled each evening with families renting LED-lit bicycles shaped like swans and cartoon characters.

The dualism—formal and informal, planned and spontaneous, commercial and civic—persists. Rukayah's research found that bazaar activity has filled urban open space in Semarang for as long as such spaces have existed. "In the history of the urban open space, bazaar events always fill the space," she wrote. "The dualistic condition between the bazaar and modern retail is complementary."

Mayor Prihadi, speaking at the 2018 event alongside Tio, acknowledged the changes but focused on the future. The city was planning an underpass project at Simpang Lima, intended to ease traffic congestion while opening commercial opportunities below ground. He described the project as beneficial for both traffic flow and business. The estimated budget ran into trillions of rupiah.

Tio expressed hope that development would reflect the wishes of residents. "The hope is that changes to the city can be absorbed and aligned with what the people of Semarang want," he said. He noted that Prihadi, unlike other officials, regularly walked through neighborhoods to hear complaints and suggestions. The implication was clear: not all leaders do the same.

What remains at Simpang Lima is a space that continues to be claimed by multiple parties. The malls sell electronics and fashion. The vendors sell food. Families stroll through the field in the evenings. The mosque calls worshippers to prayer. The field hosts celebrations and protests. The skyscrapers cast shadows over the grass where water spinach once grew in shallow swamp water.

The name itself—Simpang Lima, "five intersection"—refers to the five roads meeting at a single point. The field at the center was added by presidential decree to replace what had been taken. Fifty-six years later, the struggle over what belongs to whom has not been resolved. The space absorbs all of it—retail, worship, food, protest, celebration—without offering a final answer about what it is supposed to be.