Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport Eases Regulations in 28 Areas... Efforts to Overcome COVID-19-Induced Economic Crisis

Minister of Land, Infrastructure and Transport Kim Hyun-mi is responding to questions from lawmakers at the Land, Infrastructure and Transport Committee plenary session held at the National Assembly on the 28th. (Photo by Yonhap News)

[Asia Economy Reporter Moon Jiwon] To overcome the economic crisis caused by the spread of the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19), the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) has decided to ease regulations in 28 areas.

On the 29th, MOLIT announced, "We held the 2nd full meeting of the Land, Infrastructure and Transport Regulatory Innovation Task Force (TF) and selected short-term regulatory improvement tasks to overcome the economic crisis."

The improvement tasks focus on four areas: improving the private investment environment, reducing the burden on small business owners, improving inconveniences in daily life, and correcting unreasonable regulations, which are expected to help the public in their daily lives.

First, MOLIT will ease the area restriction regulation on complex facility sites in industrial complexes. Until now, the area of complex sites in industrial complexes was limited to less than half of the industrial facility site area, making flexible supply difficult. Accordingly, MOLIT decided to ease the upper limit regulation on complex sites for urban high-tech industrial complexes where demand for convergence between different industries is high.

The height standards for wooden buildings will also be relaxed. Under the current standards, wooden buildings must comply with criteria such as a roof height of 18m and an eave height of 15m. Considering the criticism that these restrictions make it difficult to construct wooden buildings, MOLIT plans to ease size restrictions and promote the activation of wooden construction.

In addition, regulatory easing will be pursued for ▲expanding location requirements for hydrogen charging stations ▲relaxing installation standards for freight vehicle rest areas ▲reducing green building certification fees ▲easing registration standards for construction machinery maintenance businesses.

MOLIT also plans to significantly reduce regulations that may cause inconvenience to the public.

To this end, the standards for installing dog parks will be relaxed. Although demand for dog parks has recently increased, under the Urban Parks Act, installation was only possible in neighborhood parks or playgrounds larger than 100,000㎡, causing many inconveniences. MOLIT plans to allow local governments to install dog parks considering local conditions and residents' usage status, even in parks of a certain size or larger.

Furthermore, public parking lots will be increased. Currently, due to financial limitations of local governments, it has been difficult to secure land for public parking lots. Considering that this situation is leading to the spread of parking difficulties, MOLIT has allowed supplying parking lot land to local governments at below development cost when supplied through housing site development projects.

In addition, MOLIT will ease regulations such as ▲improving selection criteria for participants in real estate price disclosure tasks ▲excluding floors when installing heliports ▲relaxing penalty imposition standards for real estate brokerage businesses.

Yoon Jong-su, the Regulatory Reform Legal Officer, said, "We will promptly carry out follow-up measures such as proactive administration and amendments to subordinate laws," and added, "We will continue to strengthen communication with the field to diversify regulatory discovery channels and promote fundamental institutional improvements."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.