Battambang Heritage Preservation Initiative Online
As soon as Battambang was returned to Cambodia in 1907, French colonial administration devised a first urban development plan for the city. They designed a grid pattern of well-defined streets, put in the urban structure and built roads. Three main streets in town were built parallel to the Sangker River, which today are called Street No. 1, 2 and 3. The west bank and the east bank were connected with two bridges in 1917. The grid was additionally separated into smaller blocks by crossing streets and back lanes and filled up with so called shop houses by Chinese-Khmer traders. The French used the fort for military purposes and erected a prison inside the compound.
From 1926, a second urban development plan was created. A newly constructed railway linked Battambang to Phnom Penh. The urban structure was extended to the west of the town, featuring some important urban axes orienting on the railway station. Psar Nath market was built in 1936; a well designed Art Déco structure on the location of an open-air market at the river front is since considered to be a significant land mark for Battambang city. Many outstanding buildings like residential villas and significant public buildings were constructed during that period.
