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South Korean here. (I live in Seoul, Kangnam.) This article contains so much mis-information about Songdo, that I would like to point out. > where lamp posts a

South Korean here. (I live in Seoul, Kangnam.) This article contains so much mis-information about Songdo, that I would like to point out. > where lamp posts are always watching you CCTVs are very, very common in South Korea. This isn't something special to Songdo, and CCTVs are the number-one reason that South Korea has the 5th highest rate of people that think walking around in the dark is safe. Nobody thinks that CCTVs are surveillance; people believe the government in general. > small touch screen display on his kitchen wall that allows him to keep track of his and his wife’s consumption of electricity, water and gas and, most important, compare it against the average statistics for the building. This is super-common in Seoul, it's not something special in Songdo or such. > It claims to have the highest concentration of green Leed-certified buildings in the world, yet it is still entirely car-based, with not even a train line to the nearby airport. One thing to keep in mind is that South Korea generally (especially Seoul) is a very public-transport friendly, with a pretty-high 40% percentage of all transport (user's own car takes 39% of all transport). The time when Songdo was planned, the high public-transport percentage was considered a 'bad-thing'. People tried to model the 'America Way', and that's why Songdo was constructed with an emphasis on car-based transport. This plan was reverted years ago, and Songdo is currently constructing four subway routes. > From South Korea to Malaysia, ‘smart cities’ turn to ghost towns Songdo is not a ghost town, that is just plain wrong. It was one of the most successful cities in South Korea. It's population is rapidly increasing every year, with a competitive rate of 4855:1 to move in Songdo. Also, unlike the article's explanation, a big fraction of Songdo population comes from provinces other than Seoul (which is something similar to rural areas in the US). Overall, this article is overly emphasizing things that are nothing to Koreans but can be seen negatively to Americans; the explanation about Songdo are plain-wrong; and I just can't see what this article is trying to say.

nemonemo 7y ago
I agree with your general points: this article over-emphasizes negative aspects of a few people and the picture it paints is not representative of overall planned cities, even Songdo. Just one nit: 4855:1 came from an article in 2007 about the initial applications for an office-tel (basically a high-rise building with offices and apartments). After 12 years, I believe Songdo has a new problem of too many ongoing housing projects and not enough people to fill the apartments to be built.
drawnwren 7y ago
Yep. One of my expat friends lived in Songdo and it was great every time I went to visit. It doesn't have the same pop density as Seoul, but it's a great mixture of a modern city and proximity to nature. Also the hour and a half ride is a big deal but not too big of a deal. Parts of Seoul are an hour subway from Seoul. When I lived there, it was close enough that we would go to our friend's place before clubbing in Gangnam some nights. (Pretty sure we took a taxi to the club though)
novok 7y ago
When you look at songdo, it looks like a small section of greater seoul in general. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Songdo-dong,+Yeonsu-gu,+Incheon,+South+Korea/@37.3961117,126.6343272,10z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x357b7624aaf774f7:0x1c27c0012f442511!8m2!3d37.3839118!4d126.6438546 https://www.google.com/maps/place/Songdo-dong,+Yeonsu-gu,+In... Also why do people trust the government when it only became a democracy about 30 years ago, and things like this happened? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_Struggle#Torture_and_death_of_Park_Jong-chol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_Struggle#Torture_and_deat...
- oblio 7y ago
  Because the government took them out of poverty? :) Funny, downvotes :-) You might not like it, but it's true, the South Korean government (and people) went from poor to rich in basically 1 generation. Just like in China, people don't really care about abuses if their overall life is improving and they're not impacted directly...
  - pcr910303 7y ago
    When I first saw your un-edited comment, I tried to calm down myself. I didn’t write angry comments. Sorry, after seeing your edited one, I couldn’t resist myself writing this comment. Your comment implies that South Koreans are e.g. pigs that don’t care about democracy but just care about their own lives. That’s very ignorant (at the very least). Your comment basically just plainly ignores so much South Korea citizens that protested to get democracy. You know what? The presidents that ran the country in a dictationship, used force to remove any protesting people got their righteousness from the US. Spanning as early as 1960 (when president Lee Seung Man tried to dictate the country with illegal elections) to 1987 (when South Korea finally got to elect our own presidents after 1960), people protested a lot. A LOT. Please search about the 1960 4.3 incident, 1979’s Bu-Ma protests, 1980’s Kwangju Democratic Uprising, 1987’s June protests, on and on... Your comment also shows your view about China. People in China care about democracy they aren’t pigs either. Have you ever heard about the incidents in Tiananmen Square? People care about democracy. Please don’t think that people only care about themselves.
reallydontask 7y ago
> CCTVs are very, very common in South Korea. This isn't something special to Songdo, and CCTVs are the number-one reason that South Korea has the 5th highest rate of people that think walking around in the dark is safe. Where did you find this figure? I wonder how the UK fares given the oft cited, but potentially wrong, stat that the UK has the highest number of CCTVs in the world.
- asutekku 7y ago
  I would think the harsh penalties for crimes plus a lot of CCTVs make the difference.
- pcr910303 7y ago
  Okay, I searched around for a bit; it's been a while since I was looking around: https://time.com/4983344/worlds-safest-best-worst-cities/ https://time.com/4983344/worlds-safest-best-worst-cities/ says Seoul is 14th in 2017 and https://safearound.com/danger-rankings/cities/ https://safearound.com/danger-rankings/cities/ says Seoul is 5th. I can't find about the rate of being safe in the dark, sorry :-(
- dustinmoris 7y ago
  London may have a huge amount of CCTV, but people in London certainly don't feel safe to walk at night through many parts of the city. London has a high crime rate, stabbings, muggings, hate crime, etc. and the Mayor of London has been ignoring the rise of violence and crime entirely for the last couple years.
  - CaptainMarvel 7y ago
    I find the inclusion of the statement about the Mayor of London to be very strange. He has very limited powers in this area [0]. In contrast to the government, who have, in real-terms, massively cut public services including policing [1], social care, education, and youth services which have a far more direct link to increasing crime - especially county lines [2] (drug networks) and youth knife crime, both of which have featured heavily in the news recently. [0]: https://fullfact.org/news/what-can-mayor-london-actually-do/ https://fullfact.org/news/what-can-mayor-london-actually-do/ [1]: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-45477960 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-45477960 [2]: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/county-lines https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/county-lines
rjf72 7y ago
If CCTVs led to a perception of safety, New York/London/Chicago would rank highly as areas people feel safe walking around at night in. Or, similarly, it would suggest that people would not feel safe walking around in areas in Korea that do not have extensive CCTVs. The people of an area make it safe or not - not surveillance. Mass surveillance does not provide much benefit but comes at extreme risk of abuse. Even without resorting to the typical examples, one needs only look to things like such as 'LOVEINT' [1]. The NSA were/(are?) spying on potential and present love interests so often that they created a tongue in cheek term for it. And obviously keep in mind that that the incidents where NSA agents were busted is likely but a fraction of all incidents. But I do think one ought also consider the typical examples. In particular the Holocaust was carried out using nothing more than a census and some incredibly primitive computing technologies provided by IBM. What will happen the next time an awful person gains power, or are we supposed to hope this will simply never happen? We ought never support, implicitly or otherwise, domestic surveillance. [1] - https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/08/24/loveint-when-nsa-officers-use-their-spying-power-on-love-interests/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/08/24...
- asutekku 7y ago
  Could also be cultural difference. You really can’t comment whether they work or not from a western person’s perspective if they are used in Asia.
  - Nasrudith 7y ago
    Cultural differences don't change objective facts even if they react differently.
- pas 7y ago
  CCTVs are probably there to stop/decrease some kind of events. For example red light cams, speeding, not stopping at STOP signs, illegal parking, vandalism, etc. Recently two guys were seen on a CCTV doing speed (amphetamine) in a car. So the police went after them, then later they have been charged. So it "works", but of course two dudes duing a few stipes of speed is not exactly the crime of the century. And ... on the other hand, as you point out, it's not the surveillance apparatus that matters, but the intent of the powers that be. IBM and censuses are still around, just as racism/xenophobia/lack-of-empathy. Census questions are a hot topic. Just as caging people that want a better future for themselves. Therefore I think CCTVs and the debate around them - especially on HN - is just noise, because so far I haven't seen any proper data and study on them.
theredbox 7y ago
The main idea of Songdo was decentralization. It wanted to push businesses and people to live outside of Seoul. Meanwhile no one is leaving Seoul for Songdo and all the people living in Songdo commute to Seoul.
f00zz 7y ago
I went to Songdo for work once. It's amazing, it feels like a science fiction city from the 25th century.
jvkersch 7y ago
I spent a few months in Songdo visiting my in-laws (and often return) and I generally concur. Specifically, I found that the area had much more of a community feel than these articles let on (local interest groups for expats and Koreans alike, libraries, a wide variety of restaurants, meeting places) and I found the quality of life higher than in some American inner cities where I've lived (LA specifically). I found the contrast between the high rises and the parks refreshing and uplifting, and it was heart-warming to see people take advantage of abandoned land to have makeshift vegetable gardens on the outskirts of town. Both the large and the small testified to the ingenuity of the people living there. Things that I didn't like so much: it definitely felt like there had been a shift away from bringing in businesses to housing, so that you end up with blocks upon blocks of apartments, and with empty business districts. I worked in a high-rise that had an identical 30-story building next to it, completely empty. The Incheon government is trying to turn the tide by attracting biotech and more universities, but it will probably take years before the balance is properly restored.
- Bartweiss 7y ago
  > the area had much more of a community feel... local interest groups for expats and Koreans alike, libraries, a wide variety of restaurants, meeting places... makeshift vegetable gardens on the outskirts of town Thank you for sharing this. Far more than the article's specific concerns like CCTV coverage, planned cities seem to fail when these things aren't present. Places like the planned core of Brasilia or Section 8 highrises in the US are defined by interchangeable spaces, a lack of pleasant third places, and restrictive use of land (either by policy, like banning gardens, or logistics, like paving deadspace and closing rooftops). Overbuilding is definitely a concern, too. It's not just a waste, it tends to feel isolating and interfere with more natural as-needed expansion. It's not as catastrophic as rendering inhabited spaces alienating, though, so hopefully things will stabilize in time.
mikem170 7y ago
> CCTVs are the number-one reason that South Korea has the 5th highest rate of people that think walking around in the dark is safe Seoul was considered very safe when I visited there ten years ago. I believe that was before CCTV cameras were common.

nemonemo 7y ago

I agree with your general points: this article over-emphasizes negative aspects of a few people and the picture it paints is not representative of overall planned cities, even Songdo. Just one nit: 4855:1 came from an article in 2007 about the initial applications for an office-tel (basically a high-rise building with offices and apartments). After 12 years, I believe Songdo has a new problem of too many ongoing housing projects and not enough people to fill the apartments to be built.

drawnwren 7y ago

Yep. One of my expat friends lived in Songdo and it was great every time I went to visit. It doesn't have the same pop density as Seoul, but it's a great mixture of a modern city and proximity to nature. Also the hour and a half ride is a big deal but not too big of a deal. Parts of Seoul are an hour subway from Seoul. When I lived there, it was close enough that we would go to our friend's place before clubbing in Gangnam some nights. (Pretty sure we took a taxi to the club though)

novok 7y ago

When you look at songdo, it looks like a small section of greater seoul in general. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Songdo-dong,+Yeonsu-gu,+Incheon,+South+Korea/@37.3961117,126.6343272,10z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x357b7624aaf774f7:0x1c27c0012f442511!8m2!3d37.3839118!4d126.6438546 https://www.google.com/maps/place/Songdo-dong,+Yeonsu-gu,+In... Also why do people trust the government when it only became a democracy about 30 years ago, and things like this happened? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_Struggle#Torture_and_death_of_Park_Jong-chol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_Struggle#Torture_and_deat...

oblio 7y ago
Because the government took them out of poverty? :) Funny, downvotes :-) You might not like it, but it's true, the South Korean government (and people) went from poor to rich in basically 1 generation. Just like in China, people don't really care about abuses if their overall life is improving and they're not impacted directly...
- pcr910303 7y ago
  When I first saw your un-edited comment, I tried to calm down myself. I didn’t write angry comments. Sorry, after seeing your edited one, I couldn’t resist myself writing this comment. Your comment implies that South Koreans are e.g. pigs that don’t care about democracy but just care about their own lives. That’s very ignorant (at the very least). Your comment basically just plainly ignores so much South Korea citizens that protested to get democracy. You know what? The presidents that ran the country in a dictationship, used force to remove any protesting people got their righteousness from the US. Spanning as early as 1960 (when president Lee Seung Man tried to dictate the country with illegal elections) to 1987 (when South Korea finally got to elect our own presidents after 1960), people protested a lot. A LOT. Please search about the 1960 4.3 incident, 1979’s Bu-Ma protests, 1980’s Kwangju Democratic Uprising, 1987’s June protests, on and on... Your comment also shows your view about China. People in China care about democracy they aren’t pigs either. Have you ever heard about the incidents in Tiananmen Square? People care about democracy. Please don’t think that people only care about themselves.

reallydontask 7y ago

> CCTVs are very, very common in South Korea. This isn't something special to Songdo, and CCTVs are the number-one reason that South Korea has the 5th highest rate of people that think walking around in the dark is safe. Where did you find this figure? I wonder how the UK fares given the oft cited, but potentially wrong, stat that the UK has the highest number of CCTVs in the world.

asutekku 7y ago
I would think the harsh penalties for crimes plus a lot of CCTVs make the difference.
pcr910303 7y ago
Okay, I searched around for a bit; it's been a while since I was looking around: https://time.com/4983344/worlds-safest-best-worst-cities/ https://time.com/4983344/worlds-safest-best-worst-cities/ says Seoul is 14th in 2017 and https://safearound.com/danger-rankings/cities/ https://safearound.com/danger-rankings/cities/ says Seoul is 5th. I can't find about the rate of being safe in the dark, sorry :-(
dustinmoris 7y ago
London may have a huge amount of CCTV, but people in London certainly don't feel safe to walk at night through many parts of the city. London has a high crime rate, stabbings, muggings, hate crime, etc. and the Mayor of London has been ignoring the rise of violence and crime entirely for the last couple years.
- CaptainMarvel 7y ago
  I find the inclusion of the statement about the Mayor of London to be very strange. He has very limited powers in this area [0]. In contrast to the government, who have, in real-terms, massively cut public services including policing [1], social care, education, and youth services which have a far more direct link to increasing crime - especially county lines [2] (drug networks) and youth knife crime, both of which have featured heavily in the news recently. [0]: https://fullfact.org/news/what-can-mayor-london-actually-do/ https://fullfact.org/news/what-can-mayor-london-actually-do/ [1]: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-45477960 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-45477960 [2]: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/county-lines https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/county-lines

rjf72 7y ago

If CCTVs led to a perception of safety, New York/London/Chicago would rank highly as areas people feel safe walking around at night in. Or, similarly, it would suggest that people would not feel safe walking around in areas in Korea that do not have extensive CCTVs. The people of an area make it safe or not - not surveillance. Mass surveillance does not provide much benefit but comes at extreme risk of abuse. Even without resorting to the typical examples, one needs only look to things like such as 'LOVEINT' [1]. The NSA were/(are?) spying on potential and present love interests so often that they created a tongue in cheek term for it. And obviously keep in mind that that the incidents where NSA agents were busted is likely but a fraction of all incidents. But I do think one ought also consider the typical examples. In particular the Holocaust was carried out using nothing more than a census and some incredibly primitive computing technologies provided by IBM. What will happen the next time an awful person gains power, or are we supposed to hope this will simply never happen? We ought never support, implicitly or otherwise, domestic surveillance. [1] - https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/08/24/loveint-when-nsa-officers-use-their-spying-power-on-love-interests/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/08/24...

asutekku 7y ago
Could also be cultural difference. You really can’t comment whether they work or not from a western person’s perspective if they are used in Asia.
- Nasrudith 7y ago
  Cultural differences don't change objective facts even if they react differently.
pas 7y ago
CCTVs are probably there to stop/decrease some kind of events. For example red light cams, speeding, not stopping at STOP signs, illegal parking, vandalism, etc. Recently two guys were seen on a CCTV doing speed (amphetamine) in a car. So the police went after them, then later they have been charged. So it "works", but of course two dudes duing a few stipes of speed is not exactly the crime of the century. And ... on the other hand, as you point out, it's not the surveillance apparatus that matters, but the intent of the powers that be. IBM and censuses are still around, just as racism/xenophobia/lack-of-empathy. Census questions are a hot topic. Just as caging people that want a better future for themselves. Therefore I think CCTVs and the debate around them - especially on HN - is just noise, because so far I haven't seen any proper data and study on them.

theredbox 7y ago

The main idea of Songdo was decentralization. It wanted to push businesses and people to live outside of Seoul. Meanwhile no one is leaving Seoul for Songdo and all the people living in Songdo commute to Seoul.

f00zz 7y ago

I went to Songdo for work once. It's amazing, it feels like a science fiction city from the 25th century.

jvkersch 7y ago

I spent a few months in Songdo visiting my in-laws (and often return) and I generally concur. Specifically, I found that the area had much more of a community feel than these articles let on (local interest groups for expats and Koreans alike, libraries, a wide variety of restaurants, meeting places) and I found the quality of life higher than in some American inner cities where I've lived (LA specifically). I found the contrast between the high rises and the parks refreshing and uplifting, and it was heart-warming to see people take advantage of abandoned land to have makeshift vegetable gardens on the outskirts of town. Both the large and the small testified to the ingenuity of the people living there. Things that I didn't like so much: it definitely felt like there had been a shift away from bringing in businesses to housing, so that you end up with blocks upon blocks of apartments, and with empty business districts. I worked in a high-rise that had an identical 30-story building next to it, completely empty. The Incheon government is trying to turn the tide by attracting biotech and more universities, but it will probably take years before the balance is properly restored.

Bartweiss 7y ago
> the area had much more of a community feel... local interest groups for expats and Koreans alike, libraries, a wide variety of restaurants, meeting places... makeshift vegetable gardens on the outskirts of town Thank you for sharing this. Far more than the article's specific concerns like CCTV coverage, planned cities seem to fail when these things aren't present. Places like the planned core of Brasilia or Section 8 highrises in the US are defined by interchangeable spaces, a lack of pleasant third places, and restrictive use of land (either by policy, like banning gardens, or logistics, like paving deadspace and closing rooftops). Overbuilding is definitely a concern, too. It's not just a waste, it tends to feel isolating and interfere with more natural as-needed expansion. It's not as catastrophic as rendering inhabited spaces alienating, though, so hopefully things will stabilize in time.

mikem170 7y ago

> CCTVs are the number-one reason that South Korea has the 5th highest rate of people that think walking around in the dark is safe Seoul was considered very safe when I visited there ten years ago. I believe that was before CCTV cameras were common.