2009: South Korea Gets a New Expressway

June 30, 2009

A dedication ceremony was held during the afternoon for a newly completed expressway in South Korea. This expressway covers 14.2 miles (22.9 kilometers) between the city of Yongin in Gyeonggi Province and the Gangnam District of South Korea’s capital city of Seoul. Plans to build the Yongin-Seoul Expressway had been developed to help reduce major traffic congestion in that heavily populated region of the country. Construction on the expressway began in October 2005

The June 30 dedication of the Yongin-Seoul Expressway specifically took place at the Geumto Tollgate along that route. Those attending this ceremony included Kim Moon-soo, who was governor of Gyeonggi Province from 2006 to 2014. Starting at midnight on July 1, the expressway was opened to traffic.

As one of the highways within South Korea’s system of expressways (officially called National expressways), the Yongin-Seoul Expressway is managed by the government-owned Korea Expressway Corporation. The Yongin-Seoul Expressway is part of a route formally designated as Expressway 171. Expressway 171 also includes the 1.6-mile (2.6-kilometer)-long Osan-Hwaseong Expressway in Gyeonggi Province; this expressway is the shortest one in South Korea’s National expressways system. Those two expressways comprising Expressway 171, however, are not directly connected to each other.

Photo Credit: Public Domain

For more information on the Yongin-Seoul Expressway (part of Expressway 171), please check out Yongin–Seoul Expressway – Wikipedia