Tag: Yongsan Garrison

So does anyone really think Yongsan Garrison will be completely turned into a park?:

Garrison commander Col. Monica Washington said the process of returning the land to the South Korean government isn’t likely to begin until July 2020 at the earliest.

“At that point then we think that we will be ready, of course if everything goes according to plan, to begin to look at some of the return, actually going through some of the returns process, which is actually going to take some time,” she told Stars and Stripes.

The next major milestone will be late next year when the Brian Allgood Community Hospital is due to close as its namesake hospital on Humphreys opens. That will trigger the closure of the commissary, the post exchange, the gas station and other facilities.

“There will be a … very minute footprint here on Yongsan, although we will still have families that we will have to support here,” Washington said in a recent interview in her office near a pedestrian overpass that crosses a busy thoroughfare that bisects the base.

She estimated it will take six or seven months to do the closure process, including moving equipment and turning off utilities, once most of the garrison is vacated in December 2019.

The military plans to maintain a small section for residual forces from the Combined Forces Command, USFK, the garrison and supporting agencies on the side of the base known as South Post. Dragon Hill Lodge, a resort-style military hotel, is planning to continue operations despite reports to the contrary. The U.S. Embassy also has residential housing in the area, although it will eventually build a new compound on a corner of the sub-base known as Camp Coiner.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link, but the ROK government is sticking with the idea of making a city park.  I suspect a park will be built one day over the old Yongsan Garrison, but it will be a smaller park the initially envisioned.  The rest of the land I would not be surprised is developed for other purposes around the smaller park.

One more thing shutting down further signaling the imminent closure of Yongsan Garrison:

U.S. elementary, middle and high schools on Yongsan will close at the end of this school year as the military population shifts to its new headquarters south of Seoul, officials said Friday.

Seoul American Elementary School and Seoul American Middle High School have been run for decades to serve the children of soldiers and others stationed in South Korea.

But Yongsan’s population has declined sharply as U.S. Forces Korea and the other commands moved to Camp Humphreys, which has its own schools, as part of a long-delayed relocation plan.

“The decision and request by the command to no longer operate schools in Seoul is based on the pace and requirements of the Yongsan transformation efforts,” the military said in a press release.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link.

Yongsan US military base in central Seoul will be open to the public for the first time in 114 years to solicit South Korean public’s views on how to transform the base into a park. Yep and it seems like it’s open to Koreans only… https://t.co/icQEoMfqFs

— Minseon Ku (@minseon_ku) November 6, 2018

Here is an opinion piece from Professor Sung-Yoon Lee of Tufts University, that discusses how ROK President Moon Jae-in did not mention the role of US forces in Korea’s liberation after World War II and instead implicates the US military’s presence at Yongsan Garrison as being a continuation of Japanese colonialism:

Consider South Korea’s presidential Liberation Day speeches. Curiously, the causal effect of the sacrifices of U.S. servicemen in vanquishing Imperial Japan and Korean liberation are not only assiduously accorded the silent treatment, but the role of the U.S. in Korea is occasionally frowned upon. President Moon Jae-in, giving his Liberation Day speech today outdoors in the sweltering heat of Yongsan, Seoul, the site of the pre-1945 Japanese military base and post-1945 U.S. military base, did mention the “ROK-U.S. alliance,” but only in the context of the recent relocation of the U.S. base.

Calling the grounds where he stood “the center of exploitation and subjugation,” Moon remarked that Yongsan, having “long been taken away from us,” now has been “returned to the arms of the people after 114 years” and has “finally become an integral part of our territory.” The implication that the U.S. military presence in Korea was an exploitative continuation of Japanese colonialism or, at least, an unwelcome usurpation of Korean sovereignty, was noteworthy.  [The Hill]

You can read the whole article at the link.

Considering how popular the Dragon Hill Lodge is, I would not be surprised if from the US side these talks get slow rolled as much as possible:

There was sharp criticism from the city of Seoul and civic groups that leaving the 240,000㎡ ROK-US CFC on the site of the Yongsan Garrison would cause the park that will be built there after the land is returned to South Korea to end up looking malformed. South Korea and the US bowed to the pressure by agreeing at the end of last year to move ROK-US CFC to a building on the precincts of South Korea’s Ministry of Defense, located nearby. The relocation of the ROK-US CFC to the Defense Ministry grounds is reportedly supposed to be completed within the year.

On the other hand, little progress has reportedly been made in deliberations between South Korea and the US about relocating the Dragon Hill Lodge, which is located on the grounds of the base. The original agreement was for the 84,000㎡ resort to remain at Yongsan regardless of the base’s relocation. But recently, objections have been raised about leaving a US military facility that is not open to South Koreans at the center of the planned park.“There have not been any official discussions, and we are currently exchanging opinions,” said Defense Ministry spokesperson Choi Hyeon-su when asked about this in April.  [Hankyoreh]

You can read more at the link.

This has been a long time coming:

The U.S. military’s main command in South Korea will officially open its new headquarters next Friday in Pyeongtaek, 40 miles south of its current home in Yongsan District, central Seoul, marking a major milestone in the relocation of the U.S. Forces Korea.

Seoul’s Ministry of National Defense announced Thursday that the opening will be celebrated with a ceremony at the new headquarters compound, in which South Korean and U.S. military officials will participate. The ministry did not disclose the list of invitees, but U.S. Secretary of Defense James Mattis arrives in Seoul next Thursday for a meeting with his South Korean counterpart, Song Young-moo, and local media assumes he’s on it.

The relocation of the headquarters follows a years-long process of moving the U.S. Forces Korea from the Yongsan Garrison in central Seoul to Camp Humphreys in Pyeongtaek, a rural city in Gyeonggi. The 8th U.S. Army relocated its headquarters from Yongsan to Pyeongtaek in July 2017.

Seoul and Washington agreed to the transition in May 2003 and set a deadline for 2020. Local authorities plan to build an ecological park at the garrison site in Yongsan once the transition is complete, with the hopes of opening the park for public use by 2027.

The new headquarters is composed of a four-story main building and a two-story annex, taking up 240,000 square meters (59.3 acres) in total. A ministry official said some other buildings on Camp Humphreys were still under construction, but are most likely to be completed by the 2020 deadline.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link, but how much of Yongsan Garrison do people think will actually become an ecological park?

There was a horrible accident over the weekend outside of Yongsan Garrison’s Gate 13:

An American family headed to a high school graduation ceremony on Yongsan Garrison was struck by tragedy on Saturday when their car was involved in a fatal collision with a motorcycle.

The crash, which occurred outside Gate 13, killed two people — one American and the South Korean motorcycle driver — and injured another American, garrison spokesman Wes Hayes told Stars and Stripes.

Hayes declined to identify the casualties and said the cause of the crash remained under investigation.

“Our hearts and prayers go out to all the victims of this tragic accident today,” Hayes said.

Many members of the community gathered at a chapel on post after the graduation ceremony to console each other and grieve.

A person at the chapel said the fatality was an American girl who was with her family on the way to watch her brother graduate from Seoul American High School. Her father, a civilian, was reportedly in critical condition.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link, but hat tip to ROK Head Guitard for leaving the below link that shows the aftermath of this accident:

This next video shows the injured American father asking for help:

Condolences to all the family and friends effected by this tragic accident.

The last part of the Yongsan Garrison relocation to Camp Humphreys will not be complete until late next year:

No building epitomizes the problems that have plagued the expansion of this Army garrison south of Seoul more than its new hospital.

The U.S. military broke ground for the Brian Allgood Army Community Hospital and Ambulatory Care Center in November 2012 on land that had been used for helicopter hangars. But numerous quality control issues and delays filled the years that followed, as the South Korean contractor struggled to meet rigid U.S. standards.

The South Korean-funded construction of the five-story, 68-bed complex is slated to be largely finished and accepted by U.S. authorities by the end of June, nearly three years past the original deadline and $67 million over budget.

Americans will then begin furnishing and equipping the facility, which is due to open for patients on Nov. 15, 2019.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read much more at the link on what caused all the delays.  The contractor blames differences in construction codes between the US and South Korea.  The article however made no mention of the various corruption scandals involving the Camp Humphreys expansion project.

Here is the new bus schedule between Yongsan Garrison and Camp Humphreys that began on April 16th:

Could this be the beginning of the end of the Dragon Hill Lodge?  I hope not:

The Ministry of National Defense plans to discuss demolishing the Dragon Hill Hotel, a lodging facility for U.S. soldiers inside the Yongsan garrison with the United States Forces Korea (USFK).

This is in line with the relocation of USFK headquarters from Yongsan to Pyeongtaek in Gyeonggi Province by the end of this year. The USFK initially planned to keep the hotel in Yongsan.

However, there have been complaints from locals that the existence of the hotel is not helpful for a plan to redevelop the Yongsan base.

“We will take enough time with the USFK to discuss the details for the demolition of the facility,” defense ministry spokeswoman Choi Hyun-soo said in a media briefing, Tuesday.  [Korea Times via a reader tip]

You can read more at the link, but the Dragon Hill Lodge is a great facility and it seems like a waste to destroy it.  Plus there is a huge number of Korean national that are employed there that would lose their jobs.  Hopefully something can be worked out.