In a telephone conversation with Yonhap, a government official revealed that the government is considering building a mall complex—complete with shops, restaurants and movie theaters—under what is now the U.S. garrison at Yongsan, which is supposed to be returned to Korea in late 2008.
Plans to turn the land above ground into a huge citizen park remain unchanged, however.
Seoul City is not happy about this—it feels that the plan doesn’t fit with the spirit or ecology of the planned park, and it’s particularly worried that the government may later use its prerogative to develop above ground as well.
And to think I was under the impression that U.S. base land was so toxic it was burning holes to California. Who knew?
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I’Park.
That is not a good idea. Seoul City is right (for once). It would invite degradation of the initial park plan, especially since there would have to be ventilation for such a underground facility which would be an eyesore.
I wonder who came up with this bad idea?
And where are all the SUVs going to park? But you knew it would end like this. This is the country where mountain-sides are paved halfway up, for God’s sake.
I think it’s an awesome idea. After all, the occupants of the apartment blocks to be constructed topside will need places to shop.
Does anyone know the actual numbers involved with the base? How much land is actually going to be given to the government?
The reason i ask is that i’ve heard that although the number of soldiers there is going to be reduced, the amount of space that’s going to be “returned” is less than what people imagine. Also, i was told a few years ago that a lot of the land will be used as a second campus for a large American university.
It’ll be fun to be there the day they start to pull down the wall that surrounds the base. I’m thinking there will be rock concerts and week-long parties, just like when the Berlin wall came down.
It would be nice if they kept a lot of the old buildings. But given the Korean preference for removing built structures that remain as evidence of selling out one’s citizens, I’m afraid most will be torn down.
At least most of the Americans will be removed from the capital, and with any luck, they are less noisy from Pyongtaek.
The land could only be used much better than it is now.
Shouldn’t the rock concerts and week-long parties only occur when the fences along the DMZ are pulled down? At least, if what you have in mind is a “Berlin Wall” type occasion.
US Army Berlin Garrison did completely leave afterwards, I believe there’s not a trace left of it. But — perhaps Koreans can innovate and reverse the order of occurrence, as you imply.
Paul, Berlin Garrison maybe, but the US still retains a significant military presence in Germany?
The party has yet to start
Its a blatant attempt at undermining the ecological significance of the park in order to keep the door open to above ground development.
Darn it…It’s… I tried to stop loading the page, but it had already gone through.
Sounds like a win-win: the public gets an aboveground park and the politicians get their kickbacks from the developers.
And the critics say Koreans are caught in the zero-sum game, and without creativity. This plan kicks the legs out from under that idea.
The Dragon Hill Hotel will stay with the Americans. Also, about 1/4 land will go for new housing for the American Embassy. Which is currently located on base, but will be moving to the side closer to the Embassy. About keeping some of the existing buildings, Several of the buildings, including the USFK Headquaters, are the original buildings that were built by the Japanese when they were headquartered on the same location. Yongsan Base hasn’t belonged to the Koreans in over 100 years. As for it becoming a park, believe it when you see it. The USFK gave their golf course back to Seoul and they wasted no time by putting up that monstrosity of a building that houses the new museum. There is too much money to be made with that prime real estate to just let it go to waste on green ground.
Maybe Lee Myung-bak will build a canal through Yongsan and they can have gondolas and call Seoul “the Venice of Asia.” Or they will just level everything and build a bunch of Richygoldville® apartment slabs for the speculators.
This is an astonishingly bad idea on several levels – at least it would be astonishing anywhere but Korea. Imagine if Bloomberg announced a plan to build a mall under Central Park or The Department of the Interior announced it was spearheading a scheme for a shopping center under the Mall in D.C. What is Korea’s national government thinking about? Why is this even on its agenda? More proof about just how far away this place is from one in which there is anything like an appropriate balance between the public sector and private enterprise.
Korean development policy seems to be “plunder and pillage.”
Yongsan Army Garrison and New York’s Central Park are approximately equal in size, too — making the proposed “underground mall” just as idiotic as Sperwer makes it sound.
This makes me wonder…By ‘park’,they mean it will be a ‘theme park’, don’t they?
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