Seoul High Court upholds cancellation of urban management plan change needed for gondola project

Seoul says it will fight ruling at Supreme Court and push for revision of enforcement decree

A rendering of a cabin for the planned Namsan gondola. [Seoul Metropolitan Government]
A rendering of a cabin for the planned Namsan gondola. [Seoul Metropolitan Government]

The Seoul Metropolitan Government on Thursday condemned a Seoul High Court ruling that struck down its urban management plan change for the Namsan gondola project, calling it "a ruling that leaves unchecked a private monopoly entrenched for 60 years and the serious mobility hardships faced by citizens." The city said it would review filing an appeal with the Supreme Court and vowed to push with full force for a revision of the enforcement decree under the Act on Urban Parks and Green Areas — the key regulatory hurdle to resuming construction.

"This ruling is an unacceptable decision that fails to adequately reflect the procedural legitimacy and legal requirements the city observed throughout the urban management plan process," the city said, adding that the plan change "was a lawful administrative measure that met the requirements for modifying an urban natural park zone."

The city said Namsan is an area where urban natural park zones and urban planning facilities — parks — overlap, and that integrated, systematic management is essential. "Revising the urban management plan to achieve that is an indispensable administrative step for the active development and management of urban parks," it said. "The claim that such a plan change is impossible undermines the very foundation of the park management system."

The city also said the court's interpretation — that a park must lose its green space and leisure functions before it can be redesignated as a facility park — was self-contradictory, amounting to saying "a park must cease to function as a park before it can be designated as one."

"It is deeply regrettable that Seoul's public-interest administrative discretion, aimed at relieving the hardships of about 12 million annual visitors and people with mobility difficulties, has not been recognized," the city said. "If the gondola project collapses, the damage will fall entirely on citizens, and we will carefully review and pursue an appeal to the Supreme Court."

The city also said delays by the central government in completing follow-up procedures were "a major factor obstructing the restoration of citizens' right to mobility and prolonging their inconvenience," and urged the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport to swiftly revise the enforcement decree. The ministry last June announced a proposed revision to the enforcement decree under the Act on Urban Parks and Green Areas that would ease the 12-meter height restriction on track and disaster-prevention structures within urban natural park zones. The city said that once follow-up procedures for the proposed revision are completed, the project can proceed legally regardless of the litigation outcome, and it plans to devote all efforts to establishing the legal foundation through the decree revision.

Kang Seok, head of the Seoul Metropolitan Government's Balanced Development Headquarters, said the ruling "failed to adequately reflect the policy judgment Seoul has pursued to guarantee citizens' right to mobility and serve the public interest." He added: "If the project is halted, we will not only suffer economic losses but also lose the opportunity to grow as a global city. We will carefully review an appeal to the Supreme Court and do our utmost to protect citizens' mobility rights and return Namsan to its citizens."

Meanwhile, Seoul High Court's Administrative Division 7, presided over by Chief Judge Kwon Sun-hyung, ruled Thursday in favor of the plaintiffs — as the first-instance court had — in a suit brought by Korea Ropeway Industry Co., the operator of the Namsan cable car, against the Seoul Metropolitan Government. Korea Ropeway Industry and the other plaintiffs filed suit in September 2024 challenging the city's decision to rezone the project site from an urban natural park zone to an urban planning facility park in order to install intermediate support pillars standing 30 meters or more on Namsan for the gondola's operation.

The Namsan cable car currently operates with two 48-passenger cabins. The city plans to build a gondola system using 25 ten-passenger cabins capable of transporting more than 2,000 people per hour to improve visitor accessibility. The first-instance court ruled in December to cancel the city's decision, finding it did not meet the standards for changing or lifting an urban natural park zone designation under the enforcement decree of the Act on Urban Parks and Green Areas.

Construction on the Namsan gondola has been suspended since October 2024, when a court accepted an injunction request filed by Korea Ropeway Industry and others.


cook@heraldcorp.com