The Seoul Metropolitan Government will begin operating 7-seat water call taxis (pic below) on the Han River from Oct 11th. Since there is rarely any traffic on the Han, a trip from Tkukseom to Yoido is expected to last 15 minutes.
Sounds interesting, but here is the catch. The fee for the trip costs 5,000 to 60,000 Won (around US$5 ~ US$60) depending on distance and the taxis will depart only if all seven seats are filled. If it does depart with a single passenger then the lone passenger has to pay for the six empty seats, in addition to his/her own fare. Also, the fact that the connecting bus and subway stations are located at a distance from the taxi stops are a bummer too.
The Seoul Government is looking to develop the water taxis as a tourist attraction and a form of mass transit. For mass transit, I think it’s a bad idea, considering that under current conditions if a person in Mokdong wants to go to his/her job in Kangnam real fast, he/she has to round up six other people going the same direction, go to the river bank, get on the taxi, get off, walk some distance to the nearest bus stop and take a bus/cab to his/her job.
So, it may be a better idea for the Seoul Government to develop them as a tourist attraction instead.
29 Comments
That’ll go over like a lead balloon.
If they integrate it to the existing mass transit system (connect the water taxi stops to buses or subway), it would be a great idea. Well, they’d have to make the routes more extensive as well…
“Which I think is a bad idea, considering under the current conditions if a person in Mokdong wants to go to his/her job in Kangnam real fast, he/she has to round up six other people going the same direction,”
This is already easily done with “bullet taxis” in the mornings and evenings. During times when someone needs to travel “real fast” there will be other people waiting as well.
“go to the river bank, get on the taxi, get off, walk some distance to the nearest bus stop and take a bus/cab to his/her job.”
If there are customers coming off at these drop-off points, taxis will take up the slack until a bus line that services it is operated.
Reminds me of Seoul cabs in the early 90s…
The killer is the price and the need to get seven people together. It’s nothing like Bangkok, where it’s useful and economically priced.
If they want to develop them as mass transit then it would be called a Ferry.
I think a ferry service would be a good idea, provided there are bus connections or walkways to train stations near the river.
As for the taxis, I think passengers will be mostly those visiting Seoul or people enjoying the outdoors on the weekend. Not really commuters.
bleh! why not offer something that will waste less money and be way more practical … like jetpacks.
Seoul always overlooks the cheaper solution in favor of the gimmick. a few circus cannons ought to get you there fast enough (and the odds of hitting an ajuma with a giant purse in Gangnam for a soft landing is pretty good, too).
I can’t wait to see the reactions on the passengers faces when a water-taxi driver flips a u-turn and then tells you that he guarantees it’s faster that way.
#4,
Or when the taxis would stop to pick up extra fare along the way. That really pissed me off. I would have taken the bus if I had wanted to sit shoulder to shoulder with a total stranger.
Not sure if this will work as a tourist attraction either. When’s the last time you came across a tourist in Seoul? (Not including the Canadian English teachers on tourist visas).
#11,
Yeah, and you probably wouldn’t want to swallow any of the water by accident, either. In all fairness, I wouldn’t drink the water from the Grand Canal in Venice, either…but at least it’s got the architecture.
It would only work as a bus. Taxi would be just too expensive because you need one person to drive and one to handle docking. Chicago has something from the train station to upper Michigan Avenue that works well with rush hour commuters. Good to see them at least thinking of taking advantage of one of Seoul’s assets, the river.
$5 is a decent fare; $60 isn’t.
If these dock in the middle of nowhere with no convenient link to the next mode of transport I reckon the passengers will be waiting quite a while for the boat the fill, and the service won’t be viable. On that note, there was a river taxi service to/from Chamsil/Youido several years (a decade?) ago. What happened to that?
Will they connect to The Grand Canal?
How about jetskis? They only need to have one passenger in order to fill up whatever remains of the seat. And, it’s faster too!
A Korean friend of mine says the original article in Korean is different from this one. Apparently, the water taxis are being advertized mainly as a tourist attraction, and not to avoid the rush hour traffic. Also, there is a flat fee of 5,000 won to 60,000 won depending on the distance you want to go, and this is not affected by whether or not the seats are filled. You may want to talk to your translator!
The river boats in Bangkok have morphed into something between actual commuter ferries and tourist vessels, and work quite well. Cheap fares are key. There is even a connection with the BTS elevated train, and it is amazing the amount of ground (or water) that can be covered in a relatively short amount of time, especially by Bangkok standards. NYC is also expanded its fleet of ferries and services. Seoul could do well to study this option seriously.
Pardon, NYC HAS also exanded . .
#15.
That’s one of the things that went through my mind when I saw this particular news items.
#17.
There isn’t an “original article”. There are several versions written by several reporters. Now the article I linked says that all seven passengers have to be present, and BTW, the reason the Korean government set up this service for the tourists you claim do not exist is so that the tourists can avoid the rush hour traffic. That and the fact that it can be used as a form of mass transit, however as I said, it is doubtful whether the mass transit idea will take off.
In the spring they were calling it a ferry. The fact that you can’t put a car on it, don’t have adequate parking at either end, the subway lines are not major ones going north and south (and would be quite the hike from the dock) and the price make this totally unfeasible for the common commuter.
#21 Well I think you’ll agree with me tourism isn’t Korea’s number one industry, this isn’t just a “claim” I’m making
Anyway, that is frustrating that there is no coherent information on this, that there are different versions of the same story. Bad journalism? Or maybe the water taxi organizers themselves aren’t sure what’s going on.
Official website for the water taxis (mostly in Korean — the official tourist language)
Korea Times article with more information
Rather unsurprisingly, no one here has considered the positive impact this could have on bike commuting. I have a Dahon folding bike with 20″ wheels, it collapses down rather small. I can bike to the Mangwon pier in less than 10 minutes. But… would they allow me on with my folded bike? What if it were in a bag?
I’ll bet that these water taxis are going to be mostly busy running back and forth from Tkukseom Park and Yeouinaru Station. It’s the sole commuter route (”express shuttle” on the official site) and will cost 5,000 won. A helluva deal for the time savings.
Meanwhile, if I want to go from Mangwon to Jamsil Pier it’s going to cost me 57,700 won, unless I’ve got 6 other people wanting to go there too. This option is much less appealing and rather expensive, unless you’re taking one of the quick routes across the river. But even a relatively short ride from Mangwon to Yeouinaru is 13,600.
Aside from the commuter line, I would have preferred to have seen this service designed to be more like what I’ve seen in Bangkok with larger boats and drastically lower fares. A “bus” service rather than taxi.
“If (a taxi) departs with a single passenger than the lone passenger has to pay for the six empty seats”
The Korea Times also made a big deal of this fact. But isn’t that what makes a taxi a taxi? Do you not pay for all four seats if you’re alone in a taxi car?
(Could you and the world please take care with your ‘then’ and ‘than’!)
Of the Korea Times’ article (Tuesday 9 October), I think it was rather silly that they justify the scheme based on the success of water transport in Venice! Even when they went to get a quote from someone at the Italian embassy it seems that person neglected to tell them some of the differences between Seoul and Venice; largely that Seoul is an inland city with wide roads in every direction through tunnels and over bridges (and perhaps soon underground, too) for it’s millions of cars and thousands of buses and taxis, one of the world’s biggest metropolitan railway systems, but with just a single navigable waterway, while Venice is a city built on hundreds of low islands in an offshore lagoon where there aren’t roads, cars or even bikes, and boats are the only method of transport to and from many parts of the city.
I think Seoul’s water taxis will be gone by the end of next year.
I remember being excited about my first Hangang scenic boat ride in Seoul back in 1987. I wasn’t expecting the Mekong or the Danube or anything, and I am an admirer of Asia’s great rivers, but I must say the impression that stuck was “What a lot of boxy concrete apartments!”
Not seeing the forest for the trees, people. “When have you ever seen a tourist in Seoul” indeed, boshintang! There are thousands of tourists trawling through the markets every day, buying up bagloads of merchandise, eating in mid-to-high end restaurants, and staying in 3 and 4 star hotels. But they’re Japanese and Chinese. Japan accounts for 40%-plus of tourist arrivals, China over 10%. China’s tourists alone far outnumber the illegal teacher arrivals.
And they travel in groups. Just maybe, groups large enough to fill the seats in those taxis.
Speaking of not seeing the forest for the trees, Linkd, have you forgotten the main source of tourism in Korea: Koreans themselves! But like I said, I don’t think you can honestly say tourism is Seoul’s strong point, even though it is a beautiful city.
Well, I think we can honestly say that Seoul, like much of the rest of Korea, has a lot more tourism-potential than it has actual tourists… yet.