‘Eco-Friendly Road Construction’

Guidelines for construction of eco-friendly roads being applied to new national trunk road projects

A senior MOCT official stresses policies designed to ensure sustainable development and efficiency of existing roads. "The government is making all-out efforts to solve such negative problems as environmental issues for the sustainable development of Korea and to maximize the efficiency of existing road facilities by adopting such state-of-the art transportation systems as ITS rather than focusing on the construction of new, super-sized roads,"said Hwang Hae-sung, assistant minister of the Headquarters for Infrastructure at the Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MOCT).
"Specifically, guidelines for the construction of eco-friendly roads, which have been jointly established by the MOCT and the Ministry of Environment since 2004, are applied to the construction of new expressways and national roads. Starting this year, the existing roads are subject to the guidelines to ensure eco-friendly operation. Intelligent transportation systems have been built up along all expressways to upgrade the existing roads into advanced ones. Congested sections of national roads and alternatives to expressways are being equipped with ITS on a gradual basis,"Hwang said.
The following are excerpts from his interview with NewsWorld.
Would you update our readers on the status of roads in Korea?
Continuous investments into roads since the 1970s have brought the total length to 100,000 km. Roads have grown into Korea's essential transportation means as they account for more than 90 percent of the nation's passenger and cargo transportation totals.
However, given the overall situation with factors like the national territory and population, the nation's road capacity still lags behind those of advanced countries. One sixth of the total trunk roads or 2,907 km in total length is congested, causing 23.1 trillion won in costs related to that congestion.
The reality is Korea needs to continue to expand its roads and improve services to create a logistics hub of Northeast Asia,
ensure balanced national land development and strengthen national competitiveness. In particular, the government plans to boost investments into urban areas with traffic bottlenecks, concentrate investment priority into finishing existing projects or improving the existing roads rather than launching new projects.
Would you be more specific about plans to develop road networks?
The government is constructing more road facilities in stages according to a plan to create an expressway network in a grid pattern with nine arterial expressways running east to west and seven running north to south so that everyone can get to any expressway within 30 minutes and to anywhere in the country within half a day by 2020.
Under the plan, the government will open four expressway routes -- Gimcheon-Hyeonpung, Cheongwon-Sangju, Iksan-Jangsu, and Gochang-Jangseong -- by pouring 2.59 trillion won into 16 new routes, measuring 997 km in total length and 12 expansion routes during 2007.
It will invest 3.11 billion won into national road construction in an effort to reduce logistical costs and increase industrial support. During 2007, 20 national road routes with 152 km in total length, including the Dupo-Cheoncheon National Road No. 37, will become operational, while 14 routes with a combined length of 109 km, including a rerouting road of the congested National Road No. 42, and eight routes with a combined length of 43 km, will break ground.
Would you introduce projects to connect South and North Korea in the case of reunification and in an international bid to link road networks in Northeast Asia?
Out of the six severed national road routes with a combined length of 206 km between the two Koreas, which the Korean government plans to reconnect in case of reunification, National Road No. 1 between Tongil (Unification) Bridge, Gaeseong and National Road No. 7 between Tongil Observatory and Onjeongni, North Korea, have been already reconnected to transport manpower and materials for overland travel.
The government is striving to reconnect the remaining closed inter-Korean roads in line with the progress of inter-Korean reconciliation and cooperation. The inter-Korean road networks will be linked with a project to build up the Asian Highway (AH) project that will extend to Russia and Europe beyond the Asian states with prospects of boosting international road cooperation.
The Asian Highway project is comprised of 55 routes with a combined length of 140, 000 km linking 32 countries, including Korea, China, Japan, Russia, India and Iran in order to promote exchanges among states in the Asian region. Going through the Korean Peninsula are AH1 - Japan-Busan-Seoul-Pyeongyang-Shinuiju-China-Vietnam-Thailand-India-Pakistan-Iran-Turkey and AH6 - Busan-Gangneung-Wonsan-Russia-China-Kazakhstan-Russia. The government plans to cement cooperative ties with the North through diverse channels, including UNESCAP, to connect the two Koreas through the Asian Highway Network.
Would you elaborate on the current status of private participation in infrastructure (PPI) projects and plans to attract investments from the private sector in a bid to cope with the government's budgetary constraints in expanding infrastructure?
The demand for budgetary expenditures in welfare and other diverse sectors is on the rise due to social and economic development amidst the government's financial constraints, so the government is lacking financial resources to invest in the construction of roads. In this vein, the government is positively striving to attract private investments into such routes with a potential for high profits as expressways. Currently, PPI projects involving six expressways, including the projected one between Seoul and Chuncheon, are under way.
The government is proactively pushing ahead with PPI projects to ensure the timely construction of urgent roads by making the most of the private sector's creativity and capital. It will continue to revamp PPI systems to minimize such burdens to people as toll charges and make them rational and competitive.
Would you explain the government's efforts to push ahead with the construction of eco-friendly roads and expand such advanced facilities as intelligent transportation systems (ITS)?
Korea has so far focused on expanding roads in terms of quantity for the purpose of industrial development. In reality, it has contributed greatly to achieving rapid economic growth. However, the other side of the coin is that conflicts, caused by environmental damages and woes surrounding inefficient road investments have surfaced.
Accordingly, the government is making all-out efforts to solve such negative problems as environmental issues for the sustainable development of Korea and to maximize the efficiency of existing road facilities by adopting such state-of-the art transportation systems as ITS rather than focusing on the construction of new, super-sized roads.
Specifically, guidelines for the construction of eco-friendly roads, which have been jointly established by the MOCT and the Ministry of Environment since 2004, are applied to the construction of new expressways and national roads. Starting this year, the existing roads are subject to the guidelines to ensure eco-friendly operation. Intelligent transportation systems have been built up along all expressways to upgrade the existing roads into advanced ones. Congested sections of national roads and alternatives to expressways are being equipped with ITS on a gradual basis.
The government plans to further beef up efforts to ensure road management and operation on the basis of environmental considerations and ITS, thus laying the groundwork for the further development of the road sector through quality improvement departing from a policy of quantitative growth as well as co-existence with the public at large. nw

Hwang Hae-sung, assistant minister of the Headquarters for Infrastructures at the Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MOCT)

(above photo) MOCT Assistant Minister Hwang explains on the overall national truck road network expansion plan during an interview with NewsWorld. Hwang is seen at center and second row among the South and North Korean delegates who were participating in a test-run on the reconnected Donghae Line.