Seoul City to Secure Over 3,000 Additional Parking Spaces This Year to Alleviate 'Juchanan'... Subsidy Criteria Also Relaxed

In Areas with Poor Parking Conditions, the City Directly Constructs Parking Lots... Currently Designing 259 Spaces, Reviewing New Sites
Actively Expanding Parking Lots Using Public Sites Including Two School Sites and Three Park Sites This Year

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] The Seoul Metropolitan Government will secure a total of 3,005 additional parking spaces this year to alleviate the chronic parking shortage in residential areas densely populated with multi-family and multi-unit houses.

On the 9th, Seoul announced that it will relax the subsidy support criteria for parking lot construction to expand public parking lots in aging residential areas and directly build parking lots in places with poor parking conditions. Public land such as schools and parks will also be actively utilized.

Seoul has continuously promoted projects to expand parking spaces, such as constructing shared parking lots, removing fences and utilizing leftover land for green parking, and opening affiliated parking lots, to secure parking spaces, which are a representative inconvenience and complaint factor in residential areas. However, the parking lot securing rate in Seoul's residential areas was 63.6% in 2020 (excluding apartment complexes), indicating that the parking shortage remains severe, with related complaints increasing every year. Among the total 426 administrative districts in Seoul, 28.6% (122 districts) have a parking lot securing rate below 50%.

Accordingly, the city will promote three major parking environment improvement plans this year: relaxing the subsidy support criteria for parking lot construction, building new parking lots in areas with poor parking conditions, and creating parking lots using public land.

Seoul will relax the subsidy support criteria for parking lot construction provided to autonomous districts. When calculating the securing rate, apartments with parking lots will be excluded so that more residential areas can become eligible for support. Currently, administrative districts with a parking lot securing rate of 100% or more are excluded from subsidy support.

Additionally, subway station areas will be newly included as eligible for parking lot subsidy support. For single stations, areas within a 100m radius, and for transfer stations, areas within a 300m radius will be eligible for parking lot construction subsidies. Parking lots that have already received city funding can also receive subsidies this year if they expand or build multi-level parking spaces.

In areas with very poor parking conditions, the city will actively address parking problems by directly constructing parking lots. The construction of a total of 259 parking spaces, including Geumcheon Doksan 2-dong Village Park (105 spaces) and Dongdaemun Gande-me Park (154 spaces), which started as a pilot project in 2020, is currently in the design phase. Seoul plans to prioritize areas with low parking lot securing rates this year and gradually expand new parking lot construction.

Parking supply will be expanded by utilizing public land such as schools and parks. This year, new parking lot construction will be promoted on the sites of two schools, Jangwon Middle School in Jung-gu and Hyewon Girls' High School in Jungnang-gu, as well as three park sites: Sangdo Neighborhood Park in Gwanak-gu, Samcheong Park in Jongno-gu, and Yangjaecheon Neighborhood Park in Seocho-gu. Utilizing public land can reduce land acquisition costs and minimize complaints related to land expropriation, enabling rapid parking lot supply.

Baek Ho, Director of Urban Transportation at Seoul City, said, “We plan to create parking lots through various parking policies to improve the poor parking environment in residential areas by expanding parking lot construction and to resolve citizens' inconveniences. We will continue to cooperate with autonomous districts to secure parking lots that citizens can conveniently use.”