Gimhae~Busan City Bus Routes: 4 Discontinued, 3 New Added

Four of the seven city bus routes running between Gimhae, Gyeongnam and Busan will be completely discontinued starting July 29.

According to Gimhae City, the routes to be discontinued are ▲124, ▲125, ▲128-1, and ▲221, which are operated by Busan City.

Route ▲1004 will be reduced from 17 buses to 9, and a new route ▲122 will be established to connect Samgye and Myeongji New Town.

To replace the discontinued routes, Gimhae City has newly created routes ▲911 (Gimhae Bulam~Busan Deokcheon Station), ▲912 (Gimhae Samgye~Busan Deokcheon Station), and ▲913 (Gimhae Samgye~Inje University~Busan Deokcheon Station), and increased the number of buses on route ▲220 (Gimhae Pungyu~Busan Hadan Station) by 2.

Since June 17, the new routes have been gradually operated, and there are plans to create route 914 connecting Jangyu and Myeongji New Town in October.

Gimhae City Hall, Gyeongnam.
Photo by Se-ryeong Lee

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At the beginning of the reorganization, the city plans to minimize inconvenience to citizens by partially adjusting the existing city bus route 1 to enhance connectivity with the light rail, and by increasing the number of buses on existing Gimhae~Busan routes 8 and 8-1 to shorten the intervals between buses.

With this reorganization, long-distance routes between Gimhae and Busan will be shortened and transfers will increase. The two cities have broadly agreed on making metropolitan transfer fares, including light rail and urban rail, completely free and are conducting practical consultations.

Park Jin-yong, head of the city's public transportation department, said, "There was some confusion as the discontinuation date of Busan buses was postponed by about 40 days during this route reorganization, but by gradually operating the new routes since June, we were able to reduce trial and error. From the end of July, when Busan buses are discontinued, the number of buses supplied will significantly decrease, so we will closely monitor citizens' inconvenience in real time and quickly improve the situation."

Earlier in early January, Busan City notified Gimhae City that it would relocate the Busan city bus depot from Busan Gusan-dong to Gangseo-gu, Busan, and operate five routes passing through Gimhae only until the end of April this year.

After several discussions and adjustments with the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, the two local governments agreed on maintaining route 1004 among the five routes, turning back the three replacement routes of Gimhae at Deokcheon Station, establishing a new Busan city bus route from Samgye to Myeongji, and discontinuing routes on July 29.

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