To deal with island traffic??which seems to worsen by the day??the provincial government plans to spend hundreds of billions of won over the next decade or so building new roads and expanding existing ones. Joseph Kim reports.
Report
This is (연오로) Yeono-ro Road in Jeju City. It is now under construction.
[slug] Yeono-ro Road to be widened into 4 lanes by late 2018
Jeju City will spend 12 billion won to widen a part of the road, 1.25 kilometers, into four lanes.
The construction is scheduled for the end of this year.
Authorities expect the widening would ease traffic congestion in (연동) Yeon-dong by giving drivers one more road option to take.
[Slug] Odeung-dong to get new next year
A new road that will connect (이도동) Ido-dong and (오등동) Odeung-dong near (연북로) Yeonbuk-ro Road will be built too.
The construction of the north-to-south road will be done next year.
[slug] Onam-ro Road to be widened to 6 lanes by 2030
The province is planning to widen (오남로) Onam-ro Road that links the Jeju Public Health Center, (한라) Halla Library and (아연로) Ayeon-ro Road into 6 lanes from 4 lanes by 2030.
The province has also planned the road network expansion project to link busy areas in the northern and southern parts of Jeju City.
New roads will start from (애조로) Aejo-ro Road and will go down to (연동)Yeon-dong, (오라동) Ora-dong, (이도동)Ido-dong, (아라동) Ara-dong and (일도동) Ildo-dong. The construction is scheduled for 2030.
The road that links Jeju National University and (연동) Yeon-dong will be expanded and an east-to-west road will be newly built to connect (아라동) Ara-dong and (봉개) Bonggae.
The total length of the planned construction is 52.8 kilometers. More than 460 billion won will be poured into the project.
Governor Won Heeryong once stressed the need to create new north-to-south roads in October last year.
His office sought input from experts and put the 5 north-to-south roads on the province’s top priority list.
INTERVIEW Park Sun-heup / Dir. of provincial road planning dept. The island lacks north-south roads. The 5.16 Road and Jungang-ro are the only main arterial roads. To ease traffic congestion, we’ll build five north-south roads and two east-west roads. <인터뷰:박순흡/제주특별자치도 도로계획담당> "(남북축은) 5.16과 중앙로가 주 간선도로여서 남북축 도로 개설이 미흡한 실정입니다. 이를 보완하기 위해 도에서는 남북축 5곳과 동서축 2곳을 심층 검토해서 추진하게 됐습니다."
[Reporter] Joseph Kim [Camera] Ko Moon-su
However, a bumpy road is expected to realize the province’s plan because authorities have to deal with difficult negotiation with land owners as land prices have soared in Jeju over the last few years.