Southern Bus Public Garage Facility Project Relaunched

Suwon City is relaunching plans to establish a southern bus public garage facility, which previously fell through after the city unilaterally pursued the project without considering land use plans. The city is now searching for new candidate sites.

According to the city, it has currently designated four locations as candidates for the southern public garage, including the area around Anryong Elementary School at 374 Gokbanjeong-dong, and is reviewing appropriate site selection and implementation plans with related departments.

Current preliminary candidate sites include 477-1 and 212 Mangpo-dong, 199-1 Gokbanjeong-dong, and 374 Gokbanjeong-dong.

Originally, the city planned to invest 18.5 billion won to construct a southern bus public garage facility at 30,000 square meters in Gokbanjeong-dong, Gwonseon-gu, with capacity for 254 buses, with completion targeted for the end of 2009.
To proceed, the city submitted a decision deliberation case for the proposed site to the Municipal Urban Planning Committee on August 14.

However, on September 5, the Urban Planning Committee rejected the proposal, stating that “the garage site promoted by the city is designated as a central commercial area for planned urbanization in the 2025 Urban Master Plan, which is irrational from a land use planning perspective."

An official from the City Urban Planning Division said, “It would be desirable to establish the facility near emergency runways with limited land use plans or in the city's outskirts."

Meanwhile, Suwon City plans to invest a total of 94.5 billion won to establish bus public garage facilities in four regions—east, west, south, and north—to address environmental problems caused by privately-operated garages scattered throughout the city and to build a quality public transportation system. The city is currently constructing the northern bus public garage (11,059 square meters in the Pajang-dong area, Jangan-gu) with completion targeted for this year.

The western bus public garage is undergoing construction design at 8,953 square meters in Homaesilbong-dong, Gwonseon-gu (15 billion won investment), and the city plans to establish an eastern bus public garage with 30,000 square meters within the Gwanggyo residential development district.