I got to Sangwangsimni mid-morning on a late June day. It was hot, just starting to hint at the sweltering weather of Seoul’s worst months, but that didn’t seem to be stopping anyone from getting out to get their business done. I came out Exit 4, where the traffic lights above the road, Wangsimni-ro (왕십리로),…
Formerly Seongnae Station (성내역), Jamsillaru is penned into a small corner between Jamsil Station, Mongchontoseong Station, and the Han River and is essentially just a point of access for the surrounding apartment complexes. Unlike most stations, Jamsillaru isn’t situated on an intersection; instead, all four exits emerge onto a small plaza where a hundred or…
Dongjak’s best real estate sits on a large hill below the city’s southernmost bend in the Han River, giving it unobstructed views of the slowly moving waters and the northern half of the city spread out beyond them. It’s home to some 165,000 residents, all of them prominent though few famous, the identities of some…
There’s nothing in Sinjeong that could, in and of itself, be considered particularly intriguing, but as I walked around I found it rather interesting how the area served as a transition between the lower income areas to the west and the relatively affluent Mokdong neighborhood to the east. I started by making a U-turn out…
Omokgyo is nice. I can’t think of another part of Seoul we’ve visited that’s more aptly described by that adjective, with its satisfied, bourgeois, slightly anodyne tones. With its upper middle to upper class housing, ample parkland, abundance of shopping, and well kempt streets, it struck me as what a friendly urban planner might come…
Seoul Sub→urban 