Socio-economic Impacts of Urban Railway Infrastructure in Seoul Using Buffer Spatial Analysis

Abstract

Many studies have been conducted for the purpose of investigating the relation between railway infrastructure investment and economic development with a wide range of results. The purpose of this study is to analyze the relationships between the provision of urban railway facilities and local economic development in case of Seoul. This paper analyzed the economic influence according to the railway stations construction using buffer spatial analysis. Data was collected from all the railway stations in Seoul, whose number was 338. The buffer spatial analysis, based on the 25 municipalities of Seoul, showed that there are a lot of differences between the municipalities. The authors found negative correlation between the ratio of the railway station area of indirect influence (AII) and financial independency (-0.53), the number of companies (-0.58), the price of apartment (-0.45). In this research, particularly, with regard to urban railway infrastructure development in Seoul, we found that region’s economic indicator with good utilization conditions for urban railway showed higher than that of the opposition.