Goyang 'K-Culture Valley' Dual-Track Development by Private and Public Sectors

The 'K-Culture Valley' project in Goyang, Gyeonggi Province, which was halted due to the termination of the agreement with a private operator, will be resumed by concurrently pursuing private and public development for each site. K-Culture Valley is a project to create a K-pop specialized arena, studios, a theme park, and commercial, lodging, and tourism facilities on a site of approximately 300,000㎡ in Janghang-dong, Ilsandong-gu, Goyang City.

Gyeonggi Province judged that CJ Live City, the project implementer, had no intention to proceed with the project, with the overall progress rate at only 3%, and thus terminated the 'K-Culture Valley Project Basic Agreement' signed in May 2016 on June 28 last year.

In September last year, CJ Live City agreed to cooperate in normalizing the project by returning commercial land to Gyeonggi Province and donating the arena building structure. Gyeonggi Province explained that CJ Live City can also participate in the public offering for the developer of the T2 site development project, including the arena.

On the 21st, Kim Seong-jung, the First Deputy Governor of Gyeonggi Province, held a press conference at the provincial government briefing room and announced the 'K-Culture Valley Project Promotion Plan.'

According to the plan, the T2 (Theme Park 2) site of 158,000㎡, including the arena, will begin construction within this year and is targeted for completion in 2028, with private entities responsible for both development and operation. To this end, Gyeonggi Province will launch a public offering for private companies in early April and will relax the bidding guidelines as much as possible to increase the possibility of private sector participation by raising floor area ratio and building coverage ratio, allowing long-term leasing of structures, and setting a cap on liquidated damages for construction delays.

Kim Seong-jung, the First Deputy Governor of Gyeonggi Province, is holding a press conference on the K-Culture Valley project on the 21st. Photo by Gyeonggi Province

The arena, a K-pop specialized performance hall with an indoor and outdoor seating capacity of 42,000, broke ground in 2021 but construction was halted in April 2023 at a 17% progress rate due to the COVID-19 pandemic and a downturn in the construction market.

Deputy Governor Kim said, "In the preliminary study related to setting a new direction for the K-Culture Valley project, the arena was found to have high marketability, and since arena facility construction is being promoted in places like Changdong and Jamsil, rapid commencement of construction is necessary. If the project proceeds as a public development rather than private, the start of construction will be delayed by more than a year due to procedures such as feasibility study services."

Earlier, the Gyeonggi Provincial Council's 'K-Culture Valley Administrative Investigation Special Committee' proposed to Gyeonggi Province in its report last month to resume arena construction as originally planned. To this end, it prioritized reviewing the public offering for private operators to construct and operate the arena facility and ordered that the bidding be conducted in the first half of this year.

The remaining three sites?T1 (Theme Park 1) site of 79,000㎡, A (lodging facility) site of 23,000㎡, and C (commercial land) site of 42,000㎡?totaling 144,000㎡ (48% of the entire site), will be developed under the supervision of Gyeonggi Housing and Urban Corporation (GH).

During this year, a master plan will be established to determine the project period, including the start of construction. If it is difficult to find a developer for the privately developed T2 site, GH will also lead the development of that site.

Deputy Governor Kim emphasized, "We will designate the K-Culture Valley area as an economic free zone to improve investment conditions for domestic and foreign companies, and will strengthen the financial foundation by contributing K-Culture Valley provincial property worth 600 billion won to GH in kind. We will do our best with Goyang City to make K-Culture Valley a world-class cultural hub."

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