How to Make Pedestrian-Friendly Streets

The car-free street scheme was actively implemented in Myeongdong Street and Jungang Street in 1997 to make streets and parking lots more accessible to pedestrians and bicycle riders. It covered shopping and tourism spots, areas in need of traditional culture preservation, areas with a large number of pedestrians, expansion areas of pedestrian environment improvement, and car-free street feasible areas.

The scheme was also implemented in Insadong Street in 1997. In 2000 it was designated as a history culture exploration street, and in 2002, as a cultural zone.

Transit malls were constructed in order to revitalize commercial districts in the city, secure pleasant and safe walking spaces, improve the landscape of urban streets, and promote the smooth operation of mass transportation.

Transit malls promote mass transportation usage and facilitate pedestrian trips by reducing the road width for vehicles and creating eco-friendly and pleasant sidewalks.

The first transit mall in Korea is the Jungang Street Transit Mall in Daegu. Construction started in February 2009, and the transit mall began operations on 1 December 2009. The four-lane vehicle road was reduced to become a two-lane road and the speed limit was reduced to 30 from 60 kilometers per hour. The sidewalk width was expanded to 12 meters from 3 meters and the number of crosswalks was increased to 10 from three. Pedestrian convenience facilities, including public transportation shelters and guidance terminals, were installed.

Green parking projects have been initiated since 2004. A local government provides the funding for parking space construction if a resident demolishes the walls or fence around their property and constructs parking spaces. They also eliminate the property walls on a straight two-way single lane road, thus creating an S-shaped residential road due to the newly opened space. This widens the view for pedestrians and drivers and reduces vehicle speed, thus helping to prevent traffic accidents involving children or adults.

The Seoul Green Parking Project aims to provide more parking spaces and promote the safety of pedestrians and residents' activities. The basic plan was established in July 2003, and implementation teams were set up in each local government. In 2004, the scheme was executed, and in 2005, the project was expanded to 25 local governments in Seoul, covering both business and development zone projects. From 2006, the projects were expanded to cover their application to alleys.

Pedestrian environment improvement districts are designated in order to create a pedestrian-friendly, safe, and pleasant walking space by discouraging large vehicle volume. A pedestrian environment improvement district has the basic goals of safety, transport convenience, accessibility, convenience, comfort, and identity. Pedestrian Environment Improvement Projects have been conducted in various parts of the country, including Itaewon district in Seoul.

According to the first survey conducted with some 600 Seoul residents in 1997 by the civic organization Networks for Green Transport, residents’ satisfaction with the pedestrian environment in Seoul marked as low as 3.48 on a scale of one to 10. A poll by the Seoul Development Institute, a research center affiliated with Seoul Metropolitan Government, showed a similar result with 3.63 out of 10.

The Seoul City Authority has since undertaken several projects to improve its pedestrian environment. Seoul residents’ satisfaction with the pedestrian environment hit 5.1 in 2005 and gradually rose to 6.0 in 2010 and 6.2 in 2012 (Seoul City, Seoul Survey).

According to an analysis by the Korea Transport Institute on changes in the means of transportation over the past 10 years, the use of passenger cars grew consistently while public transportation sharply declined from 2000 to 2010. Walking increased 5.6% during the same period, resulting in a sharp rise in pedestrian commuting at 32.4 %, the highest modal share among all means of transportation.

Seoul has seen a dramatic change in residents’ commuting modes. There was a sharp increase in the number of pedestrian commuters. The commute modal share jumped from 11.0% in 2000 to 14.4% in 2006 and 15.7% in 2010.

As the country’s first transit mall, the people-oriented, eco- friendly Dongseong Road in Jung District, Daegu has attracted many tourists with a variety of stores, putting itself on the map as one of the top 10 attractions in Daegu.

Other people-oriented areas in Seoul, such as Myeongdong, Insadong, and the street from Bukchon village to Samcheongdong Street, have also enjoyed a significant increase in the number of foreign visitors and gained popularity as major tourist spots in Seoul. Foreign visitors to Myeongdong have increased consistently to 64.3% (2009) and 82.8 percent (2013) from 59.6% (2007), while visitors to Insadong have risen to 46.6 % (2009) and 49.2 percent (2013) from 36.0 percent (2007). Visitors to the area encompassing Bukchon Hanok village and Samcheong Neighborhood accounted for only 5.6 percent in 2007, but jumped to 20.4 percent in 2009 and 33.0 percent in 2013.

The number of pedestrians who died in traffic accidents peaked at 6,675 in 1991, falling to roughly half of that a decade later. Since then, the number of fatalities has slowly gone down to a total of 2,027 in 2012, a 69.6 % decrease from 1991.

The number of pedestrian traffic fatalities per 100,000 people was the highest at 15.42 in 1991 and consistently decreased since then. By 2012 the number of pedestrians killed in traffic accidents hit 4.05, a 73.7 percent reduction from 1991.