South Korea To Move Capital To Rural Utopia

Fed up with the congestion of Seoul, President Roh Moo Hyun has designated a rural area as the site for the future 500,000 person capital.

1 minute read

July 15, 2004, 12:00 PM PDT

By Jeffrey Goodman


Many people in Seoul can list the problems with their sprawling city of 10 million: pollution, traffic, exaggerated housing prices. One of them, President Roh Moo Hyun, has given up on the city entirely. His Committee on Relocation selected rural Yeongi County, sixty miles to the south, as the next home to the world's 12th-largest economy. Designed for a half-million residents, construction could begin on the unnamed city in 2007, cost $40 billion, and be finished around 2030. Many Koreans are wondering what will happen should the peninsula ever be unified, an event many believe will happen well before the 2030 completion.

Thanks to Jeffrey Goodman

Wednesday, July 14, 2004 in The Seattle Times

Lake Powell with much of the water evaporated.

Desperate measures: Advocates weigh draining Lake Powell to fill Colorado River

Draining the reservoir could reduce evaporation losses by a couple hundred thousand acre-feet.

October 30, 2026 - Yale Environment 360

A road in north eastern Nebraska with power lines on either side, and grassy fields.

Eastern Nebraska is running out of electricity

Data centers and electrification are straining eastern Nebraska’s grid, throttling economic development.

November 6, 2026 - Grist

A rendering of a mall turned living space. People walk around a green space surrounded by apartments.

Malls are becoming the midtowns of the future

Mall and office park redevelopments are a generational opportunity to create new nodes of urbanity.

October 29, 2026 - Ben Schneider

A car drives through a puddle in NYC

NYC breaks ground on anti-flooding infrastructure project

New York City's new system will reduce stormwater flows to local sewers by 90%.

1 hour ago - Smart Cities Dive

Members of the Smoketown CLT gather for a photo

One Kentucky town’s secret to affordable housing

The Smoketown Community Land Trust has already built seven affordable homes for community members.

2 hours ago - Reasons to Be Cheerful

Two people stand under mesh coverings shaped like petals

Houston gains petal-shaped cooling infrastructure to make streets more ‘delightful’

The city has installed the pavilions along 15 blocks in Houston.

3 hours ago - De Zeen

FREE Course: Walkable City 1: Why Walkability?

After describing his path towards focusing on walkability as the essence of good planning, Jeff Speck marches through his five principal reasons for making more walkable places.

Reinventing Malls: Planning Alchemy—Turning Gray Fields Into Gold

The course focuses on the opportunities and imperatives that shape reinvention of mall sites.