Gangbyeon Osolgil / 강변 오솔길
Location: Apgujeong-dong 507, Gangnam-gu, Seoul
Access: 8 min walk from Apgujeong Station
12 min walk from Apgujeongrodeo Station
Bus 147, 301, 352, 463, 472
Han River access via Apgujeong underground passage
Hours: Open 24 hours, year-round
Admission: Free
Gangbyeon Osolgil is a narrow strip of green running about 1.5km between Seongsu Bridge and Yeongdong Bridge, wedged between the apartment blocks of Apgujeong and the Olympic Expressway. It is not a destination park.
Most people who use it live within a few minutes of it. The highway runs beside it the whole way, and an underground passage cuts through to the Han River on the other side. It exists in the leftover space between infrastructure and housing, which is exactly what makes it interesting.
Photo Essay
A visual documentation of Gangbyeon Osolgil, a narrow path held between a highway and a river, where a dense neighborhood keeps its daily walk.
Gangbyeon Osolgil, Seoul · 11:15 PM
Gangbyeon Osolgil, Seoul · 11:00 PM
Gangbyeon Osolgil, Seoul · 11:10 PM
Gangbyeon Osolgil, Seoul · 11:20 PM
Gangbyeon Osolgil, Seoul · 11:30 PM
Gangbyeon Osolgil, Seoul · 11:10 PM
Gangbyeon Osolgil, Seoul · 11:05 PM
Gangbyeon Osolgil, Seoul · 11:35 PM
Gangbyeon Osolgil, Seoul · 11:40 PM
Characteristics
A Path, Not A Park
There is no central lawn, no gate, no clear entrance. It is a line rather than a place, about 1.5km long and only wide enough for a few people to pass. You do not arrive here. You walk through it, and that changes what it is used for.
Between Highway and River
The Olympic Expressway runs along one side for the entire length. Traffic noise never fully disappears. An underpass near Apgujeong leads through to the Han River, so the path works as a corridor connecting the neighborhood to the water it is cut off from.
Neighborhood Use
Dog walkers, joggers, older residents on the exercise equipment. The people here are almost entirely local. It has none of the visitors that Yeouido or Seoul Forest draw, which makes the behavior on it more ordinary and more honest.
Reflection
I came here early because I wanted to see it before the traffic built up, and what struck me was how thin the space is. On one side apartments, on the other a highway, and this narrow line of trees holding on between them. It should not feel restful and yet people were walking their dogs, stretching, moving slowly. Compared to the Tokyo parks I had been photographing, this one is not designed to be beautiful. It is just what was left over. But it is used constantly, by people who live right there, and I think that is a different kind of value. Not a place the city gave, but a place the neighborhood claimed.