Mayor Shin Urges Government: “Do Not Treat Gwacheon as a Housing Supply Tool”

“Gwacheon is not a tool for meeting the central government’s housing supply targets. Do not force Gwacheon residents to make further sacrifices,” Mayor Shin Gye-yong said at a rally opposing a government housing plan.

The plan would add about 9,800 homes to the racecourse and Defense Counterintelligence Command sites. Shin argued that the proposal ignores the city’s urban and financial limits after Gwacheon already accepted several major development projects.

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Gwacheon is not a tool for meeting the central government’s housing supply targets. Do not force Gwacheon residents to make further sacrifices.

About 300 residents joined Shin, Gwacheon City Council Chair Hwang Sun-hee, private-sector joint committee chair Kim Hang-sik and 33 resident representatives at the Sept. 3 news conference. They called for the plan’s full withdrawal.

Shin said Gwacheon has already faced more than 5.5 trillion won in costs and obligations linked to infrastructure for the Gwacheon Knowledge Information Town, including a new station, public welfare facilities, cultural and sports facilities, a library, a highway access road and a soundproof tunnel. For a city of about 80,000 people, he described the burden as excessive.

Four public housing projects are already under way in Gwacheon, alongside private redevelopment and reconstruction. Together, the city’s housing supply could reach about 46,000 units. Adding 9,800 more homes on the two sites would exceed the city’s capacity, Shin said. The sites cover about 1.421 million square meters, similar in size to the Knowledge Information Town, but the government plan would provide more units than the town’s roughly 8,400 homes.

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Adding more housing would also increase demand and maintenance costs for transport, education, welfare, the environment and public facilities.

Shin said more housing would bring additional demand and maintenance costs for transport, education, welfare, the environment and public facilities, leaving residents and the city budget to carry the burden. He also said earlier government promises to strengthen Gwacheon’s self-sufficiency and support its development had not been adequately fulfilled.

The city’s five demands include abandoning the new housing plan, ending unilateral supply policies, prioritizing transport and living infrastructure for existing projects, implementing measures to strengthen the local economy and stopping indiscriminate greenbelt development. Shin said the city would use every legal and institutional means available if the government ignored residents and proceeded with the plan.

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We can no longer accept a pattern in which the state demands sacrifices from Gwacheon when it needs them, then ignores its promised support and shifts more development burdens onto the city.