[Editorial] Encouraging Overpopulation in Seoul

The government and ruling party are coming out with all sorts of ideas for development in the greater Seoul region in the wake of the National Assembly's passage of the bill on building a new city for government administration. A representative sampling would include moving the Seoul Airport in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province and moving provincial universities to the Seoul area. Those ideas, however, are completely out of touch with the goal of the construction of the new city. We hope they reconsider.

Put simply, the government and ruling party are contradicting themselves. On the one hand they say they are building the new administrative city to reduce overpopulation in Seoul and its surrounding cities and to achieve balanced national development, but at the same time it looks like they are promoting the opposite with more concentration in Seoul. They say they are concerned Seoul will be effectively hollowed out if government ministries move to the new city but that, too, is unfounded. Even if a little bit of a vacuum is created, they should try to use utilize that extra space instead of filling it in.

It was especially problematic the way they suggested the possibility of moving Seoul Airport. While there has yet to be anything concrete, and merely mentioning such a sensitive subject could excite the real estate market. There is an intense speculative investment frenzy going in because of the Pangyo "New Town." Local real estate prices are going to be skyrocketing if the Seoul Airport is moved as well. There is no way to know if they foresee what the effects of such talk, or if they are just trying to turn the Seoul region into a hotbed of speculation.

The same goes for the idea about moving provincial universities to Seoul or allowing schools in Seoul to expand. If those ideas become reality the Participatory Government's long campaign about a new era of provincial decentralization of authority will be a lost cause. It would also be in consistent to ease restrictions on factories in the capital region. That would only intensify the general concentration of things in Seoul, and therefore would be a reversal of policy that has tried to deter it.

The government and ruling party say these ideas are about strengthening the competitiveness of the greater Seoul region. However, it looks like the bigger motive is to appease angered popular sentiment in Seoul, which is opposed to constructing the new city. Balanced national development is something that should looked at in the context of long-term needs. Furthermore, it is not even time to relax the policy of fighting centralization in Seoul.

The Hankyoreh, 10 March 2005.

[Translations by Seoul Selection (PMS)]