The Thu Thiem Master Plan

What Thu Thiem is

Thu Thiem is a master-planned new urban area on a 657-hectare peninsula formed by a sharp meander of the Saigon River, directly opposite the historical centre of Ho Chi Minh City. The administrative entity is part of Thu Duc City, the consolidated urban region that absorbed the former Districts 2, 9, and Thu Duc in 2021. In everyday usage, "Thu Thiem" refers specifically to the new urban-area boundary defined in the city's master plan, not the wider district.

The area sits between roughly 1 and 4 kilometres east of the river from District 1's existing business spine of Le Duan, Le Loi, and Ham Nghi streets. From the Bitexco Financial Tower observation deck, the Crescent Park inside Thu Thiem is the cluster of cranes and freshly-poured slabs immediately opposite. Three road crossings already link the two sides — the Thu Thiem Tunnel running beneath the riverbed, Thu Thiem Bridge 1, and the elegant cable-stayed Thu Thiem Bridge 2 that opened in 2022. Two more bridges and Metro Line 2 are scheduled in the coming years.

Planning intent has been remarkably stable. Since the original concept in the mid-1990s, every successive plan has positioned Thu Thiem as a counterpart to District 1 rather than a replacement — a place to accommodate the office, conference, cultural, and high-density residential growth that the historic centre's heritage fabric cannot absorb. The dominant 2005 plan by Sasaki Associates introduced the formal grammar that still governs construction: eight functional areas, a central spine, a crescent-shaped public park, and a riverfront treated as a continuous civic edge rather than a barrier.

A brief history of the master plan

The idea of developing Thu Thiem dates to 1996, when the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee identified the peninsula as a site for a "new urban area" to absorb future commercial and residential growth. Prime ministerial approval followed in 1998. The land had been a low-density mix of agricultural plots, fishponds, and informal settlements; redevelopment required the resettlement of approximately 14,600 households, a process that proved enormously controversial and remained in the news through the 2010s. The 2018 Government Inspectorate report and subsequent court findings established that significant portions of the original land seizures fell outside the formally approved boundary, and an extended programme of compensation revisions and resettlement-housing construction has been working through those claims since.

Sasaki Associates, the Boston-based urban-design firm, was selected through international competition to prepare the detailed 1/2,000 master plan, formalised in 2005. The plan retained two large existing wetland reservations, organised development around a central north-south spine connecting the river to the inland edge, and reserved a long crescent of public open space — the Crescent — that arcs across the peninsula. Functional areas were drawn to layer residential, commercial, and civic uses rather than segregate them.

Infrastructure delivery began in earnest in the late 2000s. The Thu Thiem Tunnel, a 1.49-kilometre immersed-tube tunnel running under the Saigon River, opened in 2011 — at the time the largest river tunnel in Southeast Asia and a politically symbolic project. The East-West Highway it terminates into was completed in parallel, linking District 6 through District 1 to Thu Thiem and onward toward the Long Thanh expressway. The first residential project handovers — Sala Township from Dai Quang Minh and the early phases of Empire City from a consortium led by Keppel Land — followed from 2014 onward.

The 2020s have brought visible acceleration. Thu Thiem Bridge 2 opened in 2022 after a long stop-start construction. The Empire City supertall, The Metropole Thu Thiem, The River Thu Thiem, and Zeit River are all in various stages of vertical construction or hand-over. Land auctions for the high-profile Functional Area 1 plots — initially conducted in late 2021 and partially reversed when the highest bidders walked away — were restructured and re-tendered, with a fresh wave of plot allocations expected through 2026 and 2027. Metro Line 2, after years in design, has a re-confirmed alignment that runs into Thu Thiem.

The eight functional areas

The Sasaki plan divides Thu Thiem into eight contiguous zones, each with its own form-based controls, allowed uses, and characteristic skyline silhouette. Walking the peninsula north to south you cross all eight in turn. Below we summarise each. Click through for the full guide.

Functional Area 1 — The Central Business Core

The 100-hectare commercial heart of Thu Thiem and the planned home of Vietnam's first international financial centre. Designed for the tallest building heights on the peninsula and the densest commercial floorplate, FA1 is where the major office towers, hotel-branded supertalls, and the financial-services campus are programmed to rise. It contains the high-profile auction plots (3-5, 3-8, 3-9, 3-12) and is the most-watched parcel of land in Ho Chi Minh City's commercial real-estate market. The southern edge of FA1 fronts the Crescent Park.

Functional Area 2a — Northern Residential

A predominantly residential band immediately north of FA1, bordered by the Thu Thiem Tunnel approach road. Mid- to high-rise residential blocks with podium retail, calibrated to step down in height as the area approaches the riverbank. Several of the earliest Thu Thiem residential launches — including parts of Sala Township and The River Thu Thiem — sit in or adjacent to this zone.

Functional Area 2b — Residential

A continuation of the northern residential character eastward toward the wider peninsula, with slightly lower density and an emphasis on neighbourhood-scale retail. International primary schools and clinics are programmed here.

Functional Area 3 — Western Mixed Residential

Wraps the western flank of the central spine, with a mix of mid-rise residential, low-rise townhouses, and pocket parks. Strong walking connectivity to the Crescent and to the Thu Thiem Bridge 2 landing.

Functional Area 4 — Civic & Mixed Use

The civic anchor of the master plan. Programmed for an opera and exhibition complex, museum sites, and the central public-space network. Mixed-use blocks between civic plots accommodate hotels, serviced apartments, and supporting retail.

Functional Area 5 — Southern Mixed Use

South of the central civic band, FA5 transitions toward lower densities and longer block frontages. Mixed residential and commercial with significant green-space allocation, opening toward the Crescent.

Functional Area 6 — Crescent Park & Commerce

The defining piece of public realm in Thu Thiem. The Crescent is an approximately 50-hectare arc of parkland and water features running across the southern half of the peninsula, lined with mixed-use frontage. This is the equivalent of Marina Bay's Gardens by the Bay or Hudson Yards' park spine: the centrepiece around which the rest of the place orients.

Functional Area 7 — Low Density Residential

The deliberate low-rise relief at the southern peninsula. Townhouse-scale residential, villas, and a network of canals and parks intended to provide a contrast to the dense northern zones and to preserve sightlines from the river. Most of the high-end villa product in Thu Thiem sits here.

Functional Area 8 — Southern Park & Marina

The southern tip of the peninsula, dominated by a large public park and a planned marina. Limited built development, by design — the area exists to give Thu Thiem a soft, green termination rather than a hard urban edge.

Infrastructure: how Thu Thiem connects

A new urban area is only as functional as its connections, and Thu Thiem has had to invent its connectivity from scratch. The peninsula is bounded by water on three sides; before 2011 there was no road crossing at all, and the only access was a slow ferry from Quan 1. Today there are three operating crossings, with two more bridges and a metro line scheduled.

• Thu Thiem Tunnel — 1.49 km, six lanes, opened 2011. The primary east-west arterial connection, terminating in the East-West Highway (Vo Van Kiet Boulevard) on the District 1 side.
• Thu Thiem Bridge 1 — Opened in 2008, this is the older crossing connecting Thu Thiem to the southern District 1 (Nguyen Huu Canh corridor).
• Thu Thiem Bridge 2 (Ba Son Bridge) — Opened April 2022. A cable-stayed bridge with a 113-metre central pylon shaped to recall a banyan tree, connecting Ba Son in District 1 directly to the heart of Thu Thiem at Le Thanh Ton. Already the most photographed piece of new infrastructure in Ho Chi Minh City.
• Thu Thiem Bridge 3 — Programmed to link Functional Area 6 with District 4. Detailed design under way, construction expected to start in the late 2020s.
• Thu Thiem Bridge 4 — Will connect Functional Area 7 across to District 7, closing the southern crossings loop.
• Metro Line 2 — Ho Chi Minh City's second urban rail line, with a Thu Thiem station serving the central functional areas. Construction timeline has slipped repeatedly through the 2020s; the most recent reconfirmed alignment runs from Ben Thanh through District 3 and northwest to Tham Luong, with the eastward Thu Thiem extension scheduled in a later phase.

For investors, the cadence of these openings is the single most influential variable in the local capital-value story. Each crossing or station that opens compresses travel time to the District 1 office cluster, broadens the addressable rental demand, and adds a step to the long-running re-rating of Thu Thiem land prices.

Map of the master plan

The map below outlines the eight functional areas in approximate boundaries — refer to the detailed area pages for the official cadastral lines. Click an area outline to navigate to its full guide.

Real-estate development across the master plan

Thu Thiem is one of the most concentrated real-estate development programmes anywhere in Southeast Asia. Roughly 50 named residential and mixed-use projects sit somewhere on the spectrum from upcoming launch to handed over, with total committed development value well in excess of ten billion US dollars. We track the full list project-by-project in the project database; the cornerstone projects worth knowing about are summarised here.

Completed and handing-over

• Sala Township — The first large-scale residential delivery in Thu Thiem, developed by Dai Quang Minh. Phases of apartments, townhouses, and villas. The most established neighbourhood inside the master plan boundary.
• Empire City — Mixed-use waterfront flagship, including The Empire 88 supertall and the Empire City residential phases. Joint venture led by Keppel Land with Tien Phuoc and Tran Thai.
• The River Thu Thiem — Riverside high-rise residential by Refico. Three towers, completed.

Under construction

• The Metropole Thu Thiem — Multi-phase residential and mixed-use development by SonKim Land and partners. Phase 1 handed over; subsequent phases progressing.
• Zeit River — Korean developer GS E&C's Vietnam flagship, on the Functional Area 2a riverside.
• Eco Smart City — Lotte Group's mixed-use anchor on the high-profile Bridge 1 landing parcel.

Upcoming and pipeline

A second generation of launches is being staged for the Functional Area 1 auction plots and a number of plots in Areas 3 and 6. Watch the upcoming pipeline page for the running list. The cadence of these launches matters: each one re-anchors the prevailing per-square-metre price for the submarket.

Investment outlook

Thu Thiem sits in a particular niche of the Vietnamese real-estate market: high absolute prices, low running yields, and a long-dated thesis tied to infrastructure delivery and the maturation of the financial-centre programme. Three observations are worth making for anyone considering an investment here.

The infrastructure dividend is real but staggered. Each new bridge opening and each metro milestone has produced a step-change in pricing for adjacent inventory in the past, and there is no obvious reason to expect that to change. The pattern is staggered, however: Bridges 3 and 4 are years away from completion, and Metro Line 2's Thu Thiem leg later still. The capital-appreciation case for Thu Thiem is fundamentally a five-to-ten-year case, not a two-year case.

Yield is not the primary product. Premium Thu Thiem inventory routinely lets at gross yields in the 3 to 4 percent range — competitive globally, but well below what's achievable in Thao Dien, the An Phu villas, or the District 7 mid-tier. Investors looking for cash return should look elsewhere in Ho Chi Minh City. Investors looking for capital appreciation tied to a specific urban-development thesis — the kind of investor who would have bought into Singapore's Marina Bay in 2005, or London's Canary Wharf in 1995 — are the natural Thu Thiem buyer.

Foreign-quota inventory is finite and front-loaded. Every project sells its 30 percent foreign-eligible inventory in the early launch waves. By the time a project is handing over, foreign-quota stock is typically resale-only, and the secondary market is illiquid. Buyers committed to the foreign-ownership route should plan to engage at first launch rather than waiting.

Our foreign ownership guide, step-by-step buying process, tax overview, and yields and management explainer cover the operational mechanics in detail.

Living in Thu Thiem today

The Thu Thiem of 2026 is no longer a construction site, but it is not yet a mature urban quarter either. Sala Township has been a real neighbourhood for years, with international families, a clustered cafe-and-restaurant scene, and a fledgling street life. Empire City and The Metropole Thu Thiem have brought additional residents and the first wave of higher-end retail. International schools at the borders of the master plan — including ISHCMC and the British International School — are within walking or short shuttle distance from many residential parcels.

Day-to-day, residents typically commute to District 1 by ride-hail across Bridge 2 or through the tunnel — five to ten minutes outside rush hour, fifteen to twenty during peak. The Crescent Park, where complete, will transform the area into a place residents actively walk and spend time in rather than just transit through. The southern functional areas remain quieter; over the next five years their character will be defined by the pace of construction starts there.

For the operational realities of life in Thu Thiem — where the schools are, how the healthcare options compare, where to eat and drink, how transport works in practice, and the expat-specific guidance — see the dedicated living guides.

Doing business around Thu Thiem

The local business ecosystem is growing fast as residential occupancy ramps. Our directory tracks the F&B, retail, services, healthcare, and education establishments around the master plan and in the immediate adjacent neighbourhoods of Thao Dien and An Phu. If you operate a business in Thu Thiem, you can list it free; verified and featured tiers are available.

Recent developments (2024–2026)

The last two years have seen the master plan move from the long-gestation phase into delivery cadence. Notable threads:

• Re-tendering and re-allocation of the Functional Area 1 land auction plots after the 2021 bid reversals.
• Phase deliveries from Metropole Thu Thiem, The River, Empire City and .
• Bridge 3 detailed design and Bridge 4 planning advanced.
• Government reaffirmation of the financial-centre programme and the legal frameworks around it.
• Resettlement compensation revisions for previously-displaced residents.

For ongoing coverage, see Thu Thiem news.

Key figures at a glance

For quick-reference numbers, see the fact strip at the top of this page; for a project-level inventory table see the project database.

Master plan FAQs

What is Thu Thiem?

Thu Thiem is a 657-hectare planned new urban area in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, sited on a peninsula formed by a bend in the Saigon River directly opposite District 1's central business district. It is being developed as a second CBD and Vietnam's first purpose-built international financial centre, organised into eight functional areas connected to the rest of the city by tunnels, bridges, and the future Metro Line 2.

Where exactly is Thu Thiem located?

Thu Thiem occupies the western tip of Thu Duc City (formerly District 2), bounded on three sides by the Saigon River. The central business core sits roughly 600 metres east of the Bitexco Financial Tower across the river and is connected to District 1 by the Thu Thiem Tunnel, Thu Thiem Bridges 1 and 2, and the future Thu Thiem Bridges 3 and 4.

How big is Thu Thiem and how many people will live there?

The master plan covers 657 hectares of land plus surrounding water surface. At full build-out the area is planned to house approximately 150,000 permanent residents and accommodate a daytime population of around 220,000 workers and visitors. Total floor area at maturity is forecast above 5 million square metres across residential, office, retail, civic, and cultural uses.

When was the Thu Thiem master plan approved?

The original Thu Thiem New Urban Area plan was approved by the Ho Chi Minh City government in 1996 and formalised by the Prime Minister in 1998. The current detailed 1/2,000 master plan was finalised in 2005 by Sasaki Associates of the United States, with later revisions to specific functional areas. Construction of major infrastructure began in the late 2000s with the Thu Thiem Tunnel; the first residential towers were handed over in the mid-2010s.

What are the eight functional areas of Thu Thiem?

Functional Area 1 is the central business core with the tallest towers and the planned international financial centre. Area 2a sits to the north as a mid-rise residential zone. Area 2b extends residential development further east. Area 3 covers mixed residential west of the central spine. Area 4 is mixed-use with civic anchors. Area 5 forms the southern mixed-use band. Area 6 wraps the Crescent Park and combines retail with culture. Areas 7 and 8 form the low-density southern peninsula and southern park ending at the marina point.

Can foreigners buy property in Thu Thiem?

Yes, subject to Vietnam's foreign ownership quota. Under the 2014 Law on Housing and its 2023 successor, foreign individuals and entities may own up to 30 percent of units in a single apartment building, with leasehold terms of 50 years renewable once. The quota is project-specific, so availability varies. Many Thu Thiem projects — including Empire City, The Metropole Thu Thiem, and — have actively marketed foreign quota units; buyers should verify available foreign-eligible stock with the developer or a licensed brokerage before committing.

How do you get from Thu Thiem to District 1?

Four primary routes today: the Thu Thiem Tunnel (a 1.49 km submerged tunnel under the Saigon River carrying six lanes of traffic), Thu Thiem Bridge 1 (Phu My direction), Thu Thiem Bridge 2 (Ba Son to Le Thanh Ton, opened 2022), and a number of bus and ride-hail routes. Thu Thiem Bridge 3 is in construction with completion planned in the late 2020s, and Thu Thiem Bridge 4 has been programmed to connect Functional Area 7 with District 7. Metro Line 2, with a station inside Thu Thiem, is the most significant medium-term addition.

Is Thu Thiem a good real-estate investment?

Thu Thiem has consistently been one of the highest-priced submarkets in Ho Chi Minh City, with primary-market launch prices for Functional Area 1 luxury inventory regularly above 300 million VND per square metre. Yields are typically lower than in mid-tier submarkets because absolute prices are high; investors are usually buying for capital appreciation tied to infrastructure delivery and the maturation of the financial centre, not running yield. As with any concentrated thesis, the timing of bridge and metro completion, occupancy ramp at completed towers, and pricing discipline of future launches will drive forward returns. We address this in depth in our investment guide.

How does Thu Thiem compare to Pudong in Shanghai?

Thu Thiem and Pudong share the same broad blueprint — a planned new financial district directly across a river from a historic CBD. The differences matter: Pudong covers roughly 1,200 square kilometres compared to Thu Thiem's 657 hectares, and Pudong has a 30-year head start on construction. Thu Thiem is closer in scale and ambition to Singapore's Marina Bay or Tokyo's Toranomon Hills — a focused, master-planned addition rather than a parallel city.

What's the difference between Thu Thiem and Thao Dien?

Thao Dien is the established, expat-led residential neighbourhood immediately east of the master plan boundary, known for villa rentals, international schools and mature F&B. Thu Thiem is the new master-planned area itself: high-rise primary-market product, infrastructure pipeline, less mature retail. Many residents consider both clusters before buying or leasing. See our dedicated Thao Dien vs Thu Thiem comparison page for a side-by-side breakdown.

When will the international financial centre actually open?

The Functional Area 1 international financial centre is the long-term anchor of the master plan, with phased delivery indicated across the late 2020s and into the 2030s. The 2021 FA1 land auctions partially unwound; a restructured second auction round is programmed for 2026–2027. Building delivery is therefore a function of how soon those auctions complete and how aggressively winning bidders move to construction — realistic full occupancy is best dated to the early-to-mid 2030s.

Where to go from here

• Read the full guide to each of the eight functional areas
• Browse all Thu Thiem real-estate projects
• Read about Thu Thiem's tunnels, bridges, and metro line
• Understand the investment mechanics, taxes, and foreign ownership rules
• See the living guides — schools, healthcare, restaurants, transport
• Browse the business directory

Written by the Thu Thiem Vietnam editorial team. Sources include the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Planning and Architecture, Sasaki Associates, and verified developer disclosures. Last reviewed May 13, 2026. Spot something out of date? Let us know.