Tag: subway

Is everyone ready for subway stations named after companies? If there was a ROK Drop station which one do readers think it should be?:

Starting in September, Yeouido Station on Seoul Metro’s Line 9 will bear an additional name ― Shinhan Securities. This follows Shinhan Securities’ successful bid to acquire naming rights for the station. As a result, Shinhan Securities will now be associated with both Yeouido Stations on Lines 5 and 9, which are at the heart of Korea’s financial business district.

The association of a firm’s name with Yeouido Station is symbolic, given that the area houses more than 14 securities firms and numerous other financial institutions. The station also sees over 3 million users monthly.

This so-called “second name” can be acquired for metro stations through Seoul Metro’s auction system. When a company or institution wins the bid, its name will appear alongside the original station name, enclosed in brackets. This name is also announced on trains and displayed on various road and station signs.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

The word “ajumma” is supposedly no longer acceptable to say in polite Korean society and one woman took her offense to the term to the extreme by launching a knife attack after being called it on the subway:

A 37-year-old woman accused of injuring three people with a knife on a subway told police that she did so because someone called her “ajumma,” police said Saturday.

The accused, whose identity was withheld, is charged with injuring two women in her 60s and a man in his 50s inside a subway train headed to Jukjeon Station in the city of Yongin, Gyeonggi Province.

According to the subway police, the accused was speaking on the phone when one of the two women asked her to lower her voice, calling her “ajumma,” which she said offended her.

Although the word, “ajumma,” is a casual way of referring to a middle-aged woman who is unrelated to the speaker — coming from the more polite word, “ajumeoni” — it has grown to have a negative connotation over the years among Koreans.

One of the victims underwent surgery, although none of the injuries were fatal.

Korea Herald via a reader tip

You can read more at the link.

It is surprising how many elderly people ride the subway and the financial burden it is putting on the Seoul subway system:

The free subway fare for senior citizens, which was introduced in 1984, is one of the rare perks only seniors can enjoy in this aging society. It helps reduce rates of suicide and depression, as well as medical fees by keeping senior citizens active, according to the Korea Transport Institution’s research in 2015. 

However, transporting elderly riders for free doesn’t give only advantages.

It has recently emerged as a headache for heads of big city governments, especially Seoul where most of the nation’s population is concentrated, as the deficits of Seoul Metro are snowballing to a dangerous new level.

“Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Seoul Metro has faced a deficit of 1 trillion won ($ 8.1 billion) annually, and the seniors’ free rides account for 30 percent of the deficit. Before COVID-19 it took 60 percent,” Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon wrote on Facebook, Tuesday. “In the meantime, Seoul Metro has endured by issuing corporate bonds, but now it has reached its upper limit. If it was a private company, it would have already gone bankrupt.”

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but the Seoul government wants the national government to kick in money to support the subway system to prevent prices from going up even further.

This woman lost her mind on the subway and is now going to jail for it:

A Seoul court sentenced a 26-year-old woman to one year in prison Wednesday for smashing an elderly man on the head repeatedly with her mobile phone after a viral video showing the violent scene enraged many.

The incident happened in March in a subway train on Line No. 9 when the two got into a fight after the victim in his 60s chided her for spitting on the subway car. The woman was seen in the video shouting and beating the man on the head with her phone repeatedly.

The violence caused him to bleed in the head.

As the woman subsequently stood trial on charges of inflicting injuries and insults, additional violence charges were added for allegedly hitting a passenger and pouring a beverage over the passenger’s head in a subway train in October.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

This is another example of how workers got used to something and don’t want to go back to the way things were before the pandemic:

Unionized workers of Seoul Metro are strongly protesting against the city government’s plan to resume late-night subway operations, a measure proposed to tackle the worsening nighttime taxi shortage in the capital.

The union that represents workers of a part of Seoul’s subway system which runs lines 1 to 8, held a rally in front of the Seoul Metropolitan Government office, Tuesday, demanding the local government withdraw its plan to extend operating hours.

“Late-night operations were suspended not only because of the coronavirus pandemic but also due to worsening operating losses, which nearly pushed the operator into bankruptcy. It is difficult to understand why the government has abruptly announced resumption of late-night operations, without any measures to resolve these issues,” the union said in a statement.

Earlier this month, the metropolitan government said it will extend subway operating hours on weekdays until 1 a.m., thereby increasing operations by one hour from the current midnight closing time, starting at some point in June.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Fortunately no one was hurt in this derailment:

A subway train derailed near Yeongdeungpo Station in southwestern Seoul on Tuesday, delaying and partially disrupting services on line No. 1.

No casualties have been reported. The accident took place around 6:28 a.m., halting traffic on both ways of the express lines for line No. 1, according to subway operators.

Regular trains on line No. 1 are in operation, but delays have been reported. 

Around 100 passengers who were on the derailed train walked to the nearby Singil Station, also on line No. 1, to transfer to a regular train.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.