The long awaited opening of the Incheon Bridge will have tremendous impact on Songdo IBD and the region. The soft opening is this week. (Last weekend the Bridge hosted a marathon for 30,000 runners).
ChosonIlbo notes, Incheon Bridge to Open Friday The Incheon Bridge is to be officially opened on Friday[October 16], four years and four months after construction began.
The bridge connects the Songdo International Business District in the Incheon Free Economic Zone and Yeongjongdo, where Incheon International Airport is located.
To celebrate the opening of the bridge, Incheon city and the Chosun Ilbo co-host a walking tour on Saturday. Vehicles are allowed from Monday.
The bridge at 21.38 km is the country’s longest and the world’s seventh longest. Among cable-stayed bridges, it is the world’s fifth longest bridge.
By Don Southerton, Songdo IBD CityTalk Editor and Chief Blogger Songdo IBD continues to draw global attention. This recent Forbes magazine article points out the strong technology partnerships (CISCO, UT, and 3M) Gale International and the Songdo IBD project have attracted.
Very Smart Cities by Elizabeth Woyke, SONGDO, SOUTH KOREA – John B. Hynes III got the jitters when he first spied the mudflats of Songdo, South Korea, in June 2001. How would he transform the expanse of muck into a smart urban center with an integrated network of utility, transportation, real estate and recreation systems?
Eight years and 82 globe-crossing flights later, Hynes is far more assured about Songdo’s prospects. The man-made island, 40 miles southwest of Seoul, is now dotted with more than 100 buildings, including a 7,800-person apartment complex, a massive convention center and a Sheraton hotel.
Hynes’ employer, New York-based real estate developer Gale International, estimates the 1,500-acre city is 40% underway. Completion is slated for 2014. The cost: $35 billion, making it perhaps the world’s largest private real estate venture in history.
Songdo’s backers, which include Gale, Morgan Stanley and Korean steelmaker Posco, are betting the city can become a northeast Asia trade hub, linking nearby Shanghai and Tokyo. It will also be a model for a new Gale project, Meixi Lake, to be built in China’s Hunan Province starting later this year. Both cities will be “smart, sustainable and technologically ambitious,” says company Chairman Stanley C. Gale.
To conform to the U.S. Green Building Council’s energy-efficient LEED standards, Songdo buildings are incorporating special window glazing and ventilated double facades. Greywater and rain will be collected for irrigation and use in cooling towers. A network of underground pneumatic pipes will move solid waste, reducing the need for garbage trucks.
Songdo is also a petri dish for green transportation schemes. Water taxis already zip along the city’s seawater canals. Soon, a citywide bike rental service modeled on Paris’ Velibre system and a car-share system will be added. Buses powered by fuel-cells are expected within the next two to three years.
With its more than 40% green space, including a $220 million park, the city is designed to feel as airy as Vancouver. (Gale estimates Songdo will eventually house 65,000 residents and 300,000 workers.) Hynes is particularly proud of the park, which is dubbed Central Park after the New York City landmark. “Convincing the government and our partners that 100 acres of prime land should be reserved for a park was a tough sell,” he notes.
Meixi Lake will be helmed by the same architects–Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates and Arup–and follow a similar philosophy, but with a 400-acre lake instead of a park.
Data networks developed by Cisco are key to both projects. The company plans to deploy video networking technology and energy management software tools city-wide and meld municipal systems, such as education, health care, transportation and hospitality into a common network. Wim Elfrink, Cisco’s chief globalization officer, says Cisco has identified 20 services that could be linked, but will start with six or seven. The company declined to specify its investment in Songdo, but says it has committed $2 billion to South Korean projects over the next three to five years.
Residents will be able to chat with their children’s teachers, consult doctors and apply for city permits and licenses via flat screen monitors in their apartments. Buildings will be intelligent enough to guide cars to available parking spots and queue up elevators as people approach. Hotels will recognize regular guests and automatically adjust room system settings.
The projects leverage Cisco’s earlier work with schools, stadiums and utility grids. “All our expertise is coming together in Songdo,” says Elfrink. Like Gale, Cisco views Songdo as a model it can replicate around the world. It plans to build a global center for “intelligent urbanization” in Songdo and work on 10 similar projects in places like India and Saudi Arabia over the next two years. “It’s an adjacent business we expect a lot from,” says Elfrink.
United Technologies and 3M are also providing technology to Songdo and Meixi Lake. 3M is making digital signs and “stick-on film” to be used throughout both cities. UTC is providing energy-saving elevators and water-cooled air conditioning units designed to cut energy use by 20%.
Despite all the talent involved, building Songdo has hardly been a smooth path. As a city designed and constructed with private financing by a foreign company, Songdo has few precedents. Tying together people’s home, work and civic lives online has required new regulations. “This is an entirely new industry,” says Cisco’s Elfrink. “We have new questions to answer.”
Permit delays pushed the opening of Songdo’s flagship commercial building, the $500 million Northeast Asia Trade Tower, from December to late summer 2010. Gale says the building’s mixed-use nature–a combination of retail, commercial and residential space that is unusual in Korea–was the main reason for the hold-up and that all necessary permits have now been obtained.
Gale also tussled with the Korean government over a rule that the majority of students in Songdo’s International School be non-Korean–a challenge when most current Songdo residents are Korean nationals. Gale says the issue has been resolved and the school will open this September for grades kindergarten through six.
Gale is currently focusing on luring corporations to Songdo under the theory that people follow jobs. The project will be a success, says Hynes, when Songdo is full and the areas around it are “buzzing.”
Hynes isn’t expecting to see a return on Gale’s billions for two to three years. First he has to finish covering the mudflats.
The Songdo Central Park, located in the newly built city 30 kilometer west of Seoul, has begun filling its canal with 85,500 tons of seawater, Gale International Korea, co-developer of the city, said in an emailed statement yesterday.
The seawater is purified through a double filter and will prevent canal from freezing in the winter. The method will enable water taxis to operate year around, it added.
A 1.8-kilometer-long canal that run through the 100 acre park in the heart of the international business district is deisnged to incorporate many environmentally sustainable benefits in Korea, according to the U.S.-based developer. To maintain the water quality, the canal will be refreshed every 24 hours,
Songdo IBD will encourage and foster sustainable design practices by incorporating the latest design standards and technologies that reduce energy consumption, increase energy efficiency, utilize recycled and natural materials and generate clean or renewable electricity.
Six core design goals for Songdo International Business District reflect our commitment to sustainability for this new city spanning 1500 acres near Incheon, South Korea. These design goals are ambitious targets. But setting them — and meeting them — will set a new standard for green design for large-scale development projects across the globe.
Songdo IBD parcels target certification under the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design program (LEED). Third party development land sale agreements will contain language mandating that buildings erected must pursue LEED Certification. Songdo IBD is also part of the LEED-ND (Neighborhood Development) Pilot program. The LEED-ND program emphasizes neighborhood connectivity, access to transit, energy efficiency in building design, efficient infrastructure design and the provision of open space and habitat for residents of all kinds. It builds upon the principles of New Urbanism and aims to promote the incorporation of positive planning aspects into local and municipal zoning codes focused on Smart Growth, Transit Oriented Development and Green Growth. The KGBCS (Korean Green Building Certification System) is used on selected parcels within Songdo IBD. The use of both Korean and International green building rating systems ensures that projects are built to a high standard of sustainable design and construction.
Yet another part of sustainability is helping out with the direct participation with the greater Incheon community via the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) program going on at Gale International. There are a number of ways that Gale has given back to the citizens of Incheon.
Please take a quick look at the video to catch a glimpse of how Gale takes CSR seriously in Songdo IBD. Comments? Questions?
By Don Southerton, Songdo IBD CityTalk Editor and Chief Blogger
I was excited to see this announcement. Megabox is popular in Korea, so are films. Did you know the first films were shown in Korea during the late 1890s. In fact, in 1899, Burton Holmes, the great travelogue writer and lecturer, entertained the Korean royal family with motion pictures. Today Korean cinema has gained much international acclaim.
Taubman Asia, a subsidiary of U.S. mall REIT, Taubman Centers, Inc. today officially announced that cinema multiplex leader Megabox, has signed as the cinema operator and third anchor tenant in Songdo Shopping Center situated in the heart of the master-planned Songdo International Business District (Songdo IBD), Incheon, Korea. Songdo IBD is being developed by New York headquartered Gale International and Korea’s Posco E&C.
“This is the third major anchor signing to be completed for Songdo Shopping Center, following the announcement of Lotte Department Store back in April, and Tesco Homeplus in September,” said Morgan Parker, president of Taubman Asia, the manager and developer of Songdo Shopping Center.
“We are thrilled to secure Megabox as an anchor tenant. Megabox is widely recognized in Korea as the premier provider of big screen entertainment,” Parker said.
The Megabox multiplex at the Songdo Shopping Center will feature nine theaters with seating for approximately 1,900 patrons. One of the nine theaters will be “M Class,” Megabox’s up-market, luxury experience, featuring a large format screen and superior sound system.
“The Megabox deal is a significant milestone for this project, as it is the first lifestyle/entertainment provider for the shopping center in Songdo IBD,” added Parker. “This is in keeping with our vision of developing a leisure lifestyle and entertainment destination, in addition to a retail complex of international standards. The Megabox complex will perfectly augment the international luxury lifestyle shopping and amenities planned for the shopping center.”
The two-level enclosed international style shopping center, designed by globally renowned architect Daniel Libeskind, with interior design by Benoy, will be the first of its kind in Korea. It is being developed as an integrated space and includes a Lotte Department Store, a Tesco Homeplus hypermarket, a Megabox multiplex cinema, a food emporium, an ice rink, and approximately 150 specialty stores.
