By Steven L. Shields
The world’s first “property developers” emerged about 12,000 years ago. That was the approximate time when the eons-old hunter-gatherer culture of humanoids began to make a shift to settled agriculture. The increasing food supply that farming provided expanded the human population. I find it interesting that the shift took place in areas throughout the world so distant from each other that there could have been no communication or cross-development of the idea. Perhaps it was built into the human psyche to find ways to maintain adequate nutrition. Hunting continued for thousands more years, but along with farming, certain animals became domesticated as work engines and food sources.
“Property development” seems to mean little more than monetizing an area. For the “developer,” land that “sits” with trees, rocks and vegetation is “undeveloped” and thus in need of “development.” When the first farmers cleared plots of land to plant wheat and corn or the like, they cut down the trees, ripped out the tree stumps and cleared rocks to make a smoother, flatter area more conducive to crop raising. Those early farmers used the rocks to make fences. They used the trees to build shelters for their families. All seemingly very sensible. Villages, towns and cities followed. As the population grew, so did the need for farms and housing. Commerce required stores, warehouses and factories.
We are told this is progress.
Korea is a space-starved country in the modern era. The demand for housing has eclipsed the need for local agriculture (given that most of Korea’s food is now imported). In my 50-year-long connection with the country, I’ve seen thatched roofs give way to concreted and corrugated-roof “New Community” houses. In the city, the old villages outside the historical walls began to develop single-family brick-and-concrete houses of two to three stories. Then, in the 1970s, the Jamsil area began to be built up, with “modern” five-story apartment blocks displacing thousands of square meters of rice fields. By the late 1970s, new areas of Jamsil had gone up to 10 stories and featured the latest in heating, with the coal cylinders replaced by a central boiler plant that provided heated floors and hot water for the shower. All of those “ancient” buildings are long gone. The main intersection of Jamsil has 20-or-more-story high rises and is home to Lotte World and the pinnacle of extremist building, Lotte Tower, at 120 or more stories.
We are told this is progress.
Closer to my home in the western part of the city, some friends are displaced from their home of 40 years. The residents — all owners — of the flats in their building are told by the property manager that it’s time for “redevelopment.” (That word has some mean-spirited undertones). Their old building, built in the early 1980s, is only five stories high and is arguably dated from a structural standpoint. The driving force for redevelopment is the property management company’s complaints that the land value is too high for so few apartments (only about 40), now that the Seoul mayor has lifted the height restrictions on high-rise apartments. One can’t help but wonder at the rationale that it will make the city a “nicer place to live” when the construction and real estate companies will reap the rewards.
Some friends, now in their 80s, worked hard all their lives to buy their modest apartment and pay off the mortgage. They raised their children in that home. All their friends and neighbors are in the building and adjacent housing. “They’ve shopped at the local mart for decades, patronized the small restaurants and businesses in the adjacent lanes. They are profoundly broken-hearted, especially because they must move away from the area. And, although they will have an option on a place in the new construction, they will be back in debt — in their 80s, mind you — and many of their lifelong friends may never return. The “property developer” has been working hard over the past few years, and huge swaths of nearby neighborhoods have already bitten the dust. Thousands of people have been displaced. All in the name of monetizing the ever-decreasing land supply in this small country.
Is it progress when buildings are so tall there’s little sunshine reaching the city streets? (Sure, there are sunshine laws, but the limits are incredibly low). Is it progress when we pave over all the soil so the earth cannot breathe nor adequately drain the water from the summer rains and winter snows? Is it progress when buildings are so tall that one can no longer see any horizon?
Oh yes, my banker friends assure me this is progress, and it is good.
Rev. Steven L. Shields (slshields@gmail.com) has lived in Korea for many years, beginning in the 1970s. A lifelong member of the Royal Asiatic Society Korea, he has served as a director and president. He was copy editor of The Korea Times in 1977. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not reflect The Korea Times’ editorial stance.
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