[Choi Jun-young's Urban Pilgrimage] Aging City

Every time I look at the December calendar, I realize that another year is passing by. Although the passage of time is inevitable, feeling that I am aging and growing old is not something I welcome. All living beings go through the processes of birth, growth, aging, and death. Advances in science and technology may slow down this flow, but they cannot stop the process itself. The cities we live in are no different. For various reasons, when people gather in one place, a city is formed and grows. Depending on factors such as geography and industry, some cities continue to grow steadily, while others experience a short growth period and remain in that state for a long time. Everyone desires continuous growth, but just as there is no eternal youth, cities also age and decline.

Cities Age and Decline Like Living Organisms... Redevelopment and Reconstruction Are Dramatic Outcomes of Urban Change and Rebirth

However, unlike living organisms, cities can transform back into youthful appearances. Areas that seem destined to exist forever in a worn and dilapidated state suddenly transform into sparkling high-rise buildings and apartments, being reborn anew. Cities that have existed for a long time bury their past histories beneath their feet and continue by changing on top of them. The redevelopment and reconstruction familiar to us are dramatic results of such change and rebirth.

Aging cities often feel comfortable and human. Just as a person's character becomes mellow and tolerant over time, cities also show various appearances as time and history accumulate. Even the Gangnam area of Seoul, which seems all new and shiny, reveals traces of time when examined closely. The history of development that began in the 1970s has now surpassed 50 years, and with that time comes diversity. At some point, the value of oldness began to be newly recognized under the name "retro" and has become an object of consumption.

Many Seoul Apartments Supplied in the 1990s... Aging of Residential Spaces Now Fully Underway

Traces of time can become beautiful memories but also cause inconvenience to residents. Many overpasses built in the past to facilitate smooth traffic flow have, at some point, become obstacles to traffic and are gradually being demolished. Markets that once bustled with people and goods have been regarded as old, dark, and dirty places and have gradually disappeared. Attempts to maintain these places artificially and restore their former glory have mostly failed. Beautiful memories remain only in recollection. The aging of cities is used synonymously with inconvenience.

Growth proceeded alongside expansion. Leaving behind old and inconvenient places, people created new urban areas nearby. These places, consisting of better housing and wider roads, appeared with the prefix "New (Sin)" and, in contrast, the older areas began to be distinguished with the prefix "Old (Gu)." This process continued steadily, expanding the size of cities. It is common in many Korean cities that old buildings are located in the city center, while tall and new buildings occupy the outskirts.

After repeating this process several times, cities eventually encounter limits to expansion. There is no more land to develop. When a city still has abundant capital and people, changes begin again starting from the old, worn areas. Redevelopment and reconstruction, which transform old buildings and urban areas into new buildings and streets, are not possible everywhere. They require massive capital investment and can only be done where sufficient returns are expected. Aging is a universal process, but transformation is a privilege granted only to a few cities.

Choi Jun-young, Senior Advisor at Law Firm Yulchon

Problems Arising from Reconstruction and Redevelopment Lead to Promotion of Urban Regeneration as an Alternative

Our cities are aging. Although the lifespan of concrete buildings is said to be 100 years, until recently, our buildings were not constructed well enough to guarantee such a lifespan. Therefore, apartments could be reconstructed after 20 years, and this period has gradually extended to 30 years. Apartments built before the 1990s have now surpassed 30 years. This includes large-scale housing supplies such as Yeouido, Mokdong, Sanggye-dong, and many apartments built around the time of the Olympics.

These apartments, once popular as comfortable residential spaces, have become inconvenient and old as they fail to keep up with changing lifestyles. Of course, they still command high prices due to accumulated school districts, diverse living conveniences, and expectations for future reconstruction, but they are undeniably aging residential areas.

Considering that apartments supplied in the early 1990s constitute the largest proportion of Seoul's apartments, the aging of residential spaces has now fully begun, and this trend is expected to accelerate. Not only Seoul but also the first-generation new towns, which were supplied on a large scale at that time, are soon reaching 30 years. Just as the baby boomer generation is retiring all at once, apartments are aging simultaneously.

Promoting Change in Small and Medium-Sized Cities by Utilizing Resources... True Balanced Development Needed

As various problems with redevelopment and reconstruction, which erase everything and redraw the picture, have been raised, urban regeneration that gradually repairs past spaces has been promoted as an alternative. Urban regeneration, which pursues naturalness appropriate to age rather than forcibly making an aged face look young, attracted much expectation and interest, but the results so far have fallen short of expectations. This is because our lifestyle has changed significantly in a short time, and expectations have risen sharply due to improved economic levels.

Transforming aging spaces is not easy. In large cities, there is demand and capital, but transformation is delayed due to policy restrictions aimed at preventing price increases. Conversely, small and medium-sized cities lack both people and money and are helplessly passing time. Would it be impossible to facilitate reconstruction and redevelopment in large cities more conveniently and use some of the resources generated there to promote change in small and medium-sized cities? If resources secured through the reconstruction surplus profit recovery system and additional resources obtained by partially easing the price ceiling system are realized, it might not be impossible. Balanced development is not simply about relocating public institutions and supplementing infrastructure. If true balanced development means enabling all residents to live conveniently and comfortably, then seeking ways to harmonize surplus and deficient energy will be the task for us in the 2020s.

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