“I’m noticing that I can go to a shelter in the heat…”
Kim Tae-beom (63), who lives in Seongdong-gu, Seoul, came out to Seongdong-gu Office to meet with his friends during the daytime on the 3rd, when a heat wave warning had been going on for about a week in Seoul. The appointment time was 3:30 PM, but Kim arrived at around 3 PM. I had to wait for 30 minutes in the heat, but Mr. Kim headed to the ‘Smart Shelter’, a nearby bus stop.
The smart shelter, introduced for the first time in Korea by Seongdong-gu Office in Seoul in August 2020, is doing its job well in this summer heat wave. Smart shelters are air-conditioned bus stops. Therefore, many residents visit this place not only when waiting for the bus, but also when waiting for their appointment time. Currently, a total of 52 have been installed around bus stops in Seongdong-gu.
An average of 200,000 people visit each month. When the weather is hot or cold, the number of users increases significantly. According to Seongdong-gu Office statistics, the months with the most cumulative users last year were July (272,106) in first place, August 메이저사이트(229,122 people) in second, and January (170,273) in third.
Mr. Kim also said, “I’ve been here once in winter, so I deliberately made the meeting place near here.”
Residents say that unlike shelters in the heat, smart shelters are only for ‘rest’, so they have high accessibility. Mr. Kim said, “I’ve seen a lot of stories about shelters in the heat in the media, but they’re open at places like banks, and they seem to notice going in.” Places designated as shelters in the heat are places already used for other purposes, such as senior citizen centers, senior citizens’ centers, public health centers, community centers, and religious facilities.
Just as Mr. Kim stopped by to wait for his acquaintances, the smart shelter serves as a ‘rest area’ more than a bus stop. Yang Se-rim (35), who often uses the smart shelter in front of the Eungbong-dong community center near her house, said, “I usually drop by here to cool off and sweat after taking my child to the academy and go there.” said.
Since smart shelters are different from existing bus stops, there are cases where buses pass by without seeing passengers waiting for them. Yang also missed a bus like this that day. Yang laughed, saying, “It’s cool, so you just have to wait for another one.”
In addition to this, smart shelters also saved citizens in crisis situations. This is because the district office smart city integrated operation center is monitoring the CCTV (closed circuit TV ) installed in the smart shelter.
On the 12th of last month, at around 9:21 am, a woman sitting in a smart shelter collapsed. A monitoring agent who saw this immediately called 119 and safely transported the woman to the hospital. In April, a man was seen subduing a woman by the arm and taking her belongings. Police dispatched to the district office’s report separated the male perpetrator of dating violence from the female victim and took necessary measures.
Seongdong-gu Office plans to expand the smart shelter while improving its internal functions. Currently, the smart shelter is equipped with a virus sterilizer, a monitor that informs bus arrival information, a charging outlet, and a wireless charger.
Song Joon-myeong, director of Smart Inclusive City at Seongdong-gu Office, said, “We will install smart shelters in other places besides bus stops so that the smart shelters can serve as ‘love rooms’.”