Children's Park Celebrating 50th Anniversary Undergoes Renovation

Seoul City Renovates Aging Play Environment Spaces

[Asia Economy Reporter Kiho Sung] The Seoul Metropolitan Government announced on the 12th that it will completely revamp the outdated and uniform play environments by 2026 so that children, the protagonists of future society, can grow up happier and more balanced through play.

50th Anniversary of Children’s Grand Park Opening → Completely Reconstructed as a Child-Centered Family Rest Area

Celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, Children’s Grand Park will be transformed into a child-centered family rest area. Established in 1973 as the first park planned specifically for children, the park will undergo a full renovation of its aging facilities and environment to become a representative park for children.

The city plans to renovate various aging facilities including buildings such as the Octagonal Pavilion, animal performance hall, and botanical garden, as well as walking trails, ecological ponds, park lights, CCTV cameras, and soccer fields by 2025 in phases. Since 2022, major maintenance has begun on CCTV cameras, park lights, and the forest stage.

The Octagonal Pavilion will be developed into a multipurpose complex cultural space with a basement exhibition hall, a first-floor book caf?, a second-floor indoor playground, and a third-floor observation and rest area, opening in June this year. It will be a space where children, families, and citizens can enjoy education, play, and various activities together.

The animal performance hall will be transformed into a multipurpose indoor cultural performance hall with fewer than 500 seats by next year, allowing use regardless of season or weather. Future plans include operating performance programs such as plays and musicals enjoyed by children and various age groups to activate year-round park use.

The botanical garden, built in 1973 as Korea’s first modern botanical garden, has lost competitiveness compared to other botanical gardens due to its simple exhibition and viewing methods and aging facilities. It will be remodeled into a specialized space by 2025 with enhanced functions for education, experience, leisure, and rest centered on themes.

‘Roofed Outdoor Playgrounds’ Where Children Can Play Even in Fine Dust ? Established at 55 Locations Including Maehun Citizen’s Forest

Indoor playgrounds that can be used year-round without being affected by seasons or weather will be established at 55 locations within Seoul’s parks. This aims to provide a safe and comfortable play environment for children, whose outdoor play opportunities have significantly decreased due to environmental pollution and global warming, thereby contributing to the guarantee of children’s right to play.

Considering that these are buildings within parks, Seoul established a basic guideline for park-type indoor playgrounds in October 2022 to maintain the park’s original functions such as preserving the natural environment and securing open spaces in the city while creating indoor playgrounds with high public utility and usability.

The basic concept of the park-type indoor playground is a ‘roofed outdoor playground’ where play, meetings, and recreation are possible year-round. To secure indoor play space, construction is inevitably involved, so standards for building height, roof types, and building materials were established to prevent damage to the park’s natural environment or impairment of the landscape. Additionally, ideas such as installing transitional spaces like verandas, eaves, and pilotis around the building were proposed to allow indoor playground users to flexibly and dynamically use outdoor playgrounds and park forests.

Through this, indoor playgrounds within parks will be differentiated from typical urban kids’ cafes as a new type of park facility. They will be established as complex cultural spaces within parks centered on children’s diverse play activities, where parents can relax in nature, care for their children, and form community ties among residents.

The park-type indoor playgrounds will begin sequential openings starting in September next year at Maehun Citizen’s Forest and Nowon-gu Jungpyeong Children’s Park, with 48 additional indoor playgrounds planned to be added to parks by 2027, providing happy play and leisure spaces for children and their parents.

Five Large-Scale Inclusive Children’s Playgrounds for All Ages and Disabilities Opened in Seoul’s Five Regional Hub Parks

Lastly, following the first hub playground opened last year at Gwangnaru Hangang Park in the Southeast region, this year a hub-type children’s playground will be established at Boramae Park in the Southwest region. From the design stage, universal design and barrier-free concepts were introduced, and distinctive play facilities installed to create an inclusive play space where children from toddlers to elementary school students, regardless of disability, can enjoy play and adventure.

The Boramae Park playground, scheduled to open by the end of this year, will be developed on approximately 4,600 pyeong (about 15,200 square meters) including the demolished reading room site, the Air Zone, and the Mugunghwa Garden area. The detailed design is underway based on the winning plan from a public contest and feedback from nearby elementary schools and residents. Notably, the plan eliminates about a 4-meter level difference between the Air Zone and the demolished reading room site to create a flat play space, incorporates a large lawn and sand play area, and installs new types of vertical play facilities such as slides and play pillars.

Seoul plans to add three more hub-type children’s playgrounds by next year in the Northeast region’s Buk Seoul Dream Forest Park and by 2026 in the Northwest and downtown regions, completing the establishment of hub-type children’s playgrounds in Seoul’s five regions. The city will monitor the outcomes of this project and expand it mainly in autonomous districts where large-scale playground expansion is needed.

Yoo Young-bong, Director of the Seoul Metropolitan Government’s Green City Leisure Bureau, said, “Through the complete renovation of Children’s Grand Park, the creation of park-type indoor playgrounds, and the establishment of regional hub-type children’s playgrounds, we will respond swiftly to diverse citizen demands for play, rest, and leisure programs to create a park environment where not only children but also parents can be happy.”

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