Ran through the middle of the city center. It now looks like this,
This was a big deal. The removal of the highway and the daylighting of Cheonggye stream helped get mayor of Seoul elected president of South Korea. It was a big transition and eminent domain was used to removed a lot of small businesses and families.
Car traffic has simply had to make due by using alternate routes. For St. Louisans, imagine a major highway, like I-64, shutting down. You'd simply have to drive alternate routes permanently.
Seoul is bisected by a very large river, the Han. On both banks run mighty highways.
In this image, we see the highways on both banks and Seoul Forest, which is a very large park cut in half by a highway. There is a long pedestrian bridge crossing it which is visible in this image. The riverfront highways compete for space with the Han River Park, which is a greenway for bikes and pedestrians that runs the length of the river on both banks. It varies in size and sometimes crosses under or very close to the highway.
In some places, the park is a little wider, and plans are in place to make it wider still.
In many places, it is still hard to get from the city to the park. There just aren't enough safe bridges and entry points to cross the highway to get to the park. The city has made efforts to address this with a system of artsy tunnels under the highway,
The many highway and subway bridges crossing the Han River have also been converted for pedestrian and bike use with creative engineering.
As Seoul transitions into the future, they seem to be embracing an urban future where large roads are not walls and boundaries for pedestrians, but just interesting and out of the way landscape features.
Just recently, plans have been tossed around for Seoul's next mega project. They're going to build six new highways across the city. It sounds terrifying at first, but not to worry my walking friends, these highways will be underground. Only the entrance and exit ramps will be visible on the surface. When complete the surface highways will begin to be repurposed.
Looking into the future, there are plans on the table to build a satellite city on top of a highway development between Incheon and Seoul. They want to bury the highway and put a city on top of it. The highway would be many levels down with parking above it, a subway line above that, a mall above that, and the pedestrian friendly city above it all.
Now to the St. Louis part of the article. It is very hard to cross I-64 to get into Forest Park. St. Louis has bike and pedestrian tunnels too though,
It is very hard to cross I-64 downtown near Union Station too.
I-70 isn't needed by the arch and should be removed.
There are plans in the works for a new bridge across the Mississippi to connect to the highway madness over on the east side. It would send I-70 across the river north of downtown making the old stretch unneeded. This new bridge should be multi-purpose in an ideal world. If it crosses the river, it should have a pedestrian and bike component. Doesn't the Brooklyn Bridge have one of the best views in NYC? Beautiful bridges should support people as well as cars.
Also, to repeat my great wish for the St. Louis, both banks of the Mississippi should be given over to pedestrians, bikes, picnics, wildlife, flood prevention, and scenic placeness. Both banks should be very connected to each other with as many links as possible. Every bridge, new and old, should have a bikeway included.
Personally, I'd like to see the poplar street bridge rework their cable car into something interesting and publically accessible.
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This article is part of a family of comparisons between the Mississippi and Han rivers.
This post relates to highways.
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