The cemetery was opened on 1 January 1922 and was managed as a public burial ground by a committee led by committee leaders Tan Kheam Hock and See Tiong Wah–who was at that time comprador of the Hong Kong Bank. By 1929, Bukit Brown Cemetery accounted for about 40 per cent of all officially registered Chinese burials within municipal limits. The cemetery was eventually closed. In the 1970s, the cemetery faced the threat of being cleared for redevelopment, but it was eventually granted reprieve. Now, the cemetery is home to many bird species and wild life, and has as such become popular again–this time, with nature lovers. It is the only built area that is near the Bukit Brown MRT station (part of the Circle MRT line). Since there are no other developments in the vicinity, the station will remain non-operational till a later date. It was originally announced by Minister Tan Chuan-Jin in February 2012 that 5000, out of more than 100000 graves, would make way for a new 4-lane road that would cut through the cemetery. This number was reduced to 3746, from the original 5000, on 19 March 2012. It was also revealed that the rest of the cemetery would make way for a new public housing town in about 40 years time. The National Archives of Singapore digitised and released online the burial registers of the cemetery between April 1922 and December 1972, as well as a location map of the cemetery in part to help descendants check if their ancestor's graves were affected by the development. On 30 September 2015, it was reported that the cast iron gates of the cemetery were removed from their posts and would be reinstalled (after refurbishment) at the mouth of a new access road near its original location. By 2030, they would change Bukit Brown into housing, repair works are now in progress. Cantonese Cemetery Kwong Wai Siew Peck San Theng was previously a cemetery in Singapore that was established in 1870 by Cantonese and Hakka immigrants largely from the three prefectures of Guangzhou, Huizhou and Zhaoqing in Guangdong Province, China. The first words of the three prefectures, Guang-Hui-Zhao were the origins of the name , or transliterated as Kwong-Wai-Siew. Within a century, Peck San Theng (PST) became one of the biggest Chinese cemeteries in Singapore, holding more than 100,000 graves over of land. In 1979, the Singapore government