Yeongjong International City is rising as a global city of tourism and leisure with the blessed natural environment and Incheon International Airport. Yeongjong International City is drawing attention for its new projects. A large scale report project has already been underway and the development of an international tourist attraction in connection with Incheon International Airport has been announced in full execution. Also, the infrastructure to raise convenience for tenants and visitors has been quickly expanded. Incheon should pay more attention to Yeongjong International City from now on.
INTERNATIONAL TOURIST CITY WITH THE LARGEST INTEGRATED RESORT OF NORTHEAST ASIA
The construction of a large integrated resort with a casino, a shopping mall, and convention facilities began in Yeongjong International City. Through the resort, Yeongjong International City is dreaming to become a global tourist city standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Singapore, Macao, and Las Vegas.
The Paradise City, an integrated resort that opened in 2017, is putting in an additional investment of 500 billion won until 2022 to expand guestrooms and exhibition and performance facilities. The Paradise City is already operating a five-star hotel with 711 rooms, a convention center and casino, and approximately 2.5 million people visited the resort up until July 2019.
The Inspire Integrated Resort Project, the largest one in Korea, is also drawing expectations. Inspire, the main agent of the project, said they will put in 1.8 trillion won for the first phase to construct three hotel buildings (1,256 rooms), the Inspire Dome, the Arena, and a shopping center, and another 6 trillion won in 4.37 million m2 land afterwards to construct a six-star hotel, performing theater, and a casino exclusively for foreigners.
The development of the second phase of Caesars Korea’s Integrated Resort (residential commercial building, efficiency apartment) inside the Midan City gained momentum recently as it conditionally passed the review of landscaping, which is the first stage of the permission and authorization process. Through the project, the Midan City will have an apartment complex with four basements and 33 stories for 1,098 households and sales facilities. When the integrated resorts of Caesars Korea and Inspire open one after another in the future, a total of three integrated resorts with casinos, including the Paradise City, will be completed in Yeongjong International City, creating 20,000 new jobs and making it the largest integrated resort city in the Northeast Asia.
EMERGING AS A GREAT INTERNATIONAL CITY TO LIVE THROUGH EXPANDED INFRASTRUCTURE FOR LIVING
Incheon Metropolitan City and the Hyundai Motors Consortium signed the ‘MOU for Joint Cooperation for Yeongjong International City On- Demand Public Transportation System’ on June 20. Through this, Hyundai Motors is expected to enhance system operation efficiency radically by introducing the ‘MoD (Mobility on Demand) service’, which operates vehicles based on user demand based on advanced artificial intelligence technology.
The MoD Service is a new concept mobility service which assigns a vehicle to the nearest bus stop through the search of optimum path and a vehicle allocation algorithm once the user enters the point of departure and the destination using a smartphone app, and it is expected to reduce the waiting time of users greatly.
Also, a hospital level medical center will open in Yeongjong International City where the demand for medical services is increasing daily to upgrade the quality of medical services one step further. On July 15, the Sungse Medical Foundation opened Yeongjong International Hospital. Yeongjong International Hospital has a ward with 37 sickbeds, departments of internal medicine, orthopedic surgery, neurosurgery, pediatrics and radiology along with an out-patient clinic, operation rooms, rehabilitation treatment center, endoscopy center, and so on.
Also, Incheon is making efforts to expand the infrastructure for residential life such as installing the Skate Park inside the Sea Side Park, the representative park of Yeongjong-do Island, to promote the leisure life.
YEONGJONG INTERNATIONAL CITY EMERGING AS A MARINE TOURIST ATTRACTION
On June 24, a briefing session on the commencement of Hansang Dream Island was held at Lotte Hotel in Sogong-dong, Seoul. The Hansang Dream Island Project is a project costing a large amount for the development of the site and the construction of top buildings. As much as the attraction of private capital would determine the success and failure of the project, investment briefings were also held to invite domestic and foreign investors alongside the commemoration of project commencement.
Hansang Dream Island is mainly about developing an international marine tourist attraction in connection with Incheon International Airport by using a huge site developed through reclamation using soil dredged from the sea to maintain the water level at Incheon Port.
The site is approximately 1.1 times the area of Yeoeui-do Island (3.32 million m2), and 2.321 trillion won of private capital will be put in until 2022 to develop a water park, aquarium, five-star hotel, combined shopping mall, education and research facilities, theme park, and so forth.
IFEZ expects that the development of Hansang Dream Island will have the effect of promoting production worth 15 trillion won and creating jobs for 18,000 people to contribute to the revitalization of the local economy, and that it will enormously contribute to employment creation in Incheon, an increase of tax revenues, the attraction of foreign investors, and expanding tourist attracting effects.
