KOREA Seoul Airport pike to Inchon

OREA

Seoul Airport pike to Inchon

It was the 20th century equivalent of the crossing of the Delaware by Washington to surprise King George III’s Hessian mercenaries who then were torn apart immediately after celebrating Xmas at Trenton NJ in 1776. The name Inchon lives in military history for the place where US Marines under the UN flag landed nearly 50 years ago in General MacArthur’s brilliant counterstroke, an act of strategic daring that transformed the course of a war and of world history. Unable to break out of the tiny stalemated perimeter on the southeastern tip of Korea and using the US navy to execute a clockwise envelopment of the communist forces with the Inchon landing, about midway up the west coast of the peninsula, the allied commander regained the nearby southern capital of Seoul, and by threatening their supply lines forced the disorderly retreat of North Korean forces — making possible the peaceful development of the free Republic of Korea. Today in among the coves and islands where the Marines swarmed ashore half a century ago to save Korea dredges are exhuming fill from the seabed and two islands are being partly flattened to join them into one large flat artificial island which will be host to Korea’s major new international airport. And to service the airport investors are financing a 6&8-lane toll road and a 4.4km long double-deck bridge over the Young Jong channel, a tunnel and another bridge over the Han River connecting the new airport-on-an-island to the Korean motorway network and the capital.

The unfolding financial problems of an overborrowed economy that has grown like topsy and the prospect of beggar-thy-neighbor protectionism among the major nations has to cast a pall over a megaproject like that today at Inchon. It may be delayed. But it is probably sufficiently advanced and important that it will make it through, local observers say.

The project is the first under new arrangements for concessioning major infrastructure to investors in Korea. New Seoul International Airport Freeway Company Ltd (NSIAFC) has raised $1.9b which together with $375m from the government will build 40km of 6 and 8 lane toll motorway from the eastern bank of the Han River over the river into a pair of 3 lane tunnels 1.0km long, across to the coast. At this point, North Inchon, new port and industrial land is under development to take advantage of the new airport and its associated surface transport links.

The roads then go on the 4.4km bridge — a suspension span of 550m, 2.2km of truss and 1.6km of steel box girder — to the new airport island. The bridge section provides for 6 road lanes on top and 4 road lanes below where there are also 2 electric train lines. There are 900k sq m of asphalt pavement in the project, 11m cub m of earthwork and 35 bridges. Construction started Nov 95 with completion due Nov 01. NSIAFC has a 30 year lease to collect tolls from two barrier plazas, Singonghang plaza with 10 manual and 8 e-toll lanes, and Bookinchon with 4 and 4 toll lanes.

The roadway is connected at its eastern end to highways on either bank of the Han River, which lead 30km to downtown Seoul. This is one of the world’s great metropolitan areas — 12m pop. Traffic on the road is projected at 101k veh/day when it opens, 165k by 2010 and 240k veh/d in 2020. Major investors in the project are Samsung and 4 Korean construction companies. The concessionaire is interested in ramp metering, road weather surveillance, variable message signs, traffic surveillance and sensing as well as toll equipment. (Contact Tyson Kim, Manager Technical Controls, NSIAFC 82 32 516 8162x5 fax 82 82 32 511 6273 kimts@newfreeway.co.kr)