Korean Job Discussion Forums

[adzee1]

[/quote]
-Culture is a huge part of breathing life into a city. New York isn't the most famous city in the world just for Wall Street--take away all the local culture and cultural events, and you're left with Songdo.
-Speaking of Songdo, proximity and ease of access are important. It should be possible to live in an area without a car.
[/quote]

Yes I agree , although I dont think "culture and cultural events" are the norm in Korea. Well not comparable with NYC, London, Paris, Barcelona etc... Most things I have seen here in terms of events, music etc...seems a little soulless, tacky and lacking any great innovation.

[sublunari]

Trashcans and culture and trees and not cloning every single building and covering everything with huge ugly neon signs, yes, but more money needs to be spent on people going around to clean up the cities every single day, paid for (at least in the beginning) by imposing large fines on litterbugs.

Parks. And I don't mean Korean parks, which are always next to highways and filled with bizarre ugly trees on stilts with enormous dirt baseball fields. These are not parks. These are apocalyptic wastelands. Look at the gardens around the old palaces in Seoul or outside of huge temples like Bulguksa, and put those everywhere. Parks may not seem as valuable as grocery stores or apartment buildings, but money is nothing without the time and the space to enjoy it, which brings me to my next point:

Japan and the United States have been your models for decades. It's time to take a look at Bhutan.

People should not be working more than eight hours a day, five days a week.

[Zyzyfer]

I agree with the wider roads bit. Nothing insane, but roads with no sidewalks where pedestrians and cars are jockeying to get through shouldn't be necessary. That kind of stuff is okay in a back alley or a quiet little residential "villa-style" neighborhood where traffic is nonexistent anyway, but that's it.

Ban the everliving crap out of parking on sidewalks. This seriously ticks me off when I have to walk down a street with cars flying by because some asshats wanted to park on the sidewalk. Plus it looks intensely tacky and ugly. Exceptions for business delivery purposes only (require a sticker or something).

Grassy areas are important but I think newer cities here already caught on to that wave.

Walking streets where street carts and cool bars or outdoor hangouts would probably go a long way. I don't like street carts everywhere, either, but I think it'd be awesome to have Singapore-style hawker centers and things scattered about town.

[chasmmi]

Oh and cyclepaths for motorbikes.

[motiontodismiss]

Limit all buildings to 5 floors above the ground. All villas/onerooms/officetels must secure 1.5 parking spaces per unit. A bunch of fire and building safety requirements, such as sprinklers in every building. Fines of 10 million won or higher plus fitting them at the owner's expense. Building ordinance would dictate that buildings must be designed to withstand a 9.0 earthquake and last 100 years. Build parks and public parking garages with plenty of spaces that residents and guests can use. Turn those into transit centers with bus transfers to downtown and/or other locations in the city, and "park and ride" type places where people carpoolers can meet up. And most of all, PLAN PLAN PLAN.

Oh and BAN large corporate supermarkets and megachurches (or megaanything for that matter-megasynagogues, megatemples, or megamosques are banned too) on any piece of land that doesn't border a road at least 6 lanes wide. Also a complete ban on corporate megastores or franchises in the downtown area. Also the main downtown area should be a walking street (hence the garages and transit system outside those areas).

All streets designed to accommodate cars must be at least 10 meters wide excluding sidewalk, which must be at least 1.5 meters wide on each side. Parking is illegal everywhere except where parking spaces are clearly marked. Parking tickets start at 500k won and booting. Clearly marked spaces for emergency vehicles. Parking in these zones=2 million won and 200 hours community service. Clearly marked handicapped spaces and fines starting at 5 million won for violations.

Sidewalk parking will be punished by immediate towing and a minimum fine of 1 million won (going to infinity, based on the MSRP of your vehicle) and jail time & car impounding for repeat offenders. No exceptions as each city block will be designed with an alley that delivery vehicles can use. Trash cans on every block, and littering to be punished by a minimun fine of 1 million won plus 8 hours community service, cleaning up other people's trash. Designated areas for street carts to do business.

Also, tax incentives for corporations/universities/whatever to move to the city, preferrably in the outskirts where they could have a large, parklike campus like Pepsico in Westchester. This would create jobs for the locals.

[goreality]

I'm going to have to say get some more creative with names and slogans. Most of the slogans are cliche or include the word hub, special, international, or new. Not every single place needs a slogan, a tree, a flower, an animal, official colors, a song and mascots either.
Two recent redevelopments in Seoul that completely irk me are Digital Media City (DMC?) and Dongdaemun History and Culture Park (Dongdaemun Park?). The names are too long.
Also the Songdo area seems very elitist and bland like a futuristic cross between a business park and a military base. Perhaps add a few dilapidated buildings for squatters and give them some spray paint.

[happiness]

hahaha. you guys have to remember that all of these must be made by the locals, and pretty much the locals who are in their 40s-60s. theyre the ones who made things how they are, maybe in 20 years or so (no culture is static, but Koreas pretty darn close).

Ive been here 12 years, coming for 15+, and Im sitting in a cafe in one of those Daewoo Trump Worlds. The businesses that go in are the same ones in the poorer neighborhood where I live. THE SAME! they maybe are just more pricey.

No, culture is an INDIVIUDUAL concept and Korea is still a long way from embracing this. OR until more of these places are run by women, then it may change.

hahahahahaha noobies....sigh....im bored too

[motiontodismiss]

Well I think the old people need to die before we see some change.

[Who's Your Daddy?]

1) City hall should require apartment developers have at least one parking space per unit. I bet my apartment has more cars with permission stickers than there are spots.

2) City hall should open a bid for a towing company license. The winning company would get the right to tow away.

[markhan]

[cdninkorea]

Some of you guys would make great totalitarian dictators. I agree with having more garbage cans, bike lanes, clearly marked streets, etc. but the idea of forcing developers to build buildings a certain way, regardless of whether or not there's a market to support it, is immoral.

For example: Make developers build more small apartments (what if the demand for large apartments is bigger? I think developers are better at judging that, since it's their money on the line).

[eamo]

[markhan]

[motiontodismiss]

[Stan Rogers]

If trash cans are put everywhere they will quickly become giant overflowing piles of garbage, crap, unrecycled recyclings, food garbage, old rotten furniture, broken appliances, car tires, you name it. The more quickly these piles are cleaned up, the more quickly they will reappear.

Nobody wants to look at it.

Nobody want to deal with it.

Nobody wants to pay higher local taxes to clean it up.

The Koreans have "been there, seen it, done that."