From Wildfire Recovery to Climate Crisis Prevention
Transforming the City’s Safety Infrastructure with “Safety Administration” in 2026
Andong City has designated 2026 as the inaugural year for becoming a "safe city where citizens can live with peace of mind and in good health," and will take its disaster response system to the next level.
The city plans to complete the substantial recovery of areas affected by wildfires, while simultaneously strengthening proactive prevention infrastructure and everyday safety management to address the era of climate crisis. Through these efforts, Andong aims to enhance the overall resilience of the city.
Last year’s large-scale wildfires left deep scars across the local community. Andong City intends to further advance its recovery system, not only restoring the affected areas to their original state but also helping them regain the foundations of daily life and economic activity, and enabling community functions to return to normal. The city believes that building resilience after a disaster is the most practical investment in safety to prepare for future disasters.
Alongside recovery, there will be a significant expansion of preventive policies. As the nature of disasters becomes more complex due to rapid climate change, such as localized heavy rainfall, the limitations of a response system focused solely on post-disaster recovery have become clear. Andong City will sequentially implement disaster prevention projects, such as improving drainage facilities and waterways, focusing administrative resources on eliminating risk factors before they occur.
In particular, the city will proactively improve disaster-vulnerable elements closely connected to daily life, such as river maintenance and management of small waterways, thereby enhancing the safety of local infrastructure including farmland, residential areas, and road networks. These measures are expected not only to reduce the scale of damage but also to serve as key mechanisms for the rapid restoration of urban functions in the event of a disaster.
Efforts to improve the precision of disaster response will also include the creation of a "disaster information map." For 36 flood-prone river and inland areas and 37 households living within dam flood levels, the city will map out expected inundation ranges, required evacuation zones, and evacuation routes. This will enable faster and more accurate citizen evacuation and on-site response during actual disasters. The goal is to minimize confusion during response operations and improve the speed and accuracy of field actions.
In the area of everyday safety, management will become even more thorough. Since a single accident involving major facilities such as roads and bridges can lead to large-scale damage, the city will reduce risk factors in advance through regular inspections and preventive reinforcement. Regular inspections will be conducted on 181 road facilities, including bridges and tunnels, and 24 detailed inspections and diagnoses will be systematically carried out on sections requiring periodic checks, to detect abnormal signs early and implement necessary reinforcements.
In the field of traffic safety, the city will continue to improve the structure of hazardous roads, focusing on areas with a high risk of accidents. This year, it aims to upgrade seven road alignments and improve two intersections, with the goal of raising the level of safety that citizens experience in their daily lives.
Andong City envisions creating a "virtuous cycle of recovery," where cities that have experienced disasters become even stronger, through an integrated safety policy that organically connects recovery, prevention, and everyday safety. By considering safety as the foundation of citizens’ lives and a key factor in urban competitiveness, the city plans to accelerate the creation of a sustainable safe city by incorporating feedback from the field and citizens into its policies.
An official from Andong City stated, "In 2026, we will continue the substantial recovery of wildfire-affected areas and thoroughly establish a disaster prevention system to prepare for the era of climate crisis. We will steadfastly pursue policies to make Andong a safe city where citizens can live with peace of mind."
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