Korea embarking on `u-city` project

The Korean government plans to take a leading role in building futuristic cities complete with the latest information technology infrastructure and "ubiquitous" environment, officials said yesterday.

A number of local governments, such as New Songdo City and Busan, have expressed interest in pursuing the so-called "u-city" project. However, they have not gone much beyond drawing basic blueprints and have given little consideration on how to connect similar services between cities.

"U-city" refers to an envisioned futuristic city that aims at offering a high quality of life for residents in terms of security, welfare and technology among others. This, officials say, will be achieved by integrating IT infrastructure and ubiquitous information services into urban space. Ubiquitous information services refers to seamless, wireless access from anywhere.

Applied technologies involve broadband convergence network, radio frequency identification, ubiquitous sensor network, home networking, WiBro, digital multimedia broadcasting, telematics, geographic information system, location based system, smart card system and video conference technologies, etc.

The Ministry of Information and Communication, in collaboration with the Ministry of Construction and Transportation, set up a task force for the project last Friday.

The team, headed by a director each from the MIC and MOCT, consists of officials from local governments and related institutes and experts from academia. It will enact a law to support u-city construction next year.

The official u-city project will integrate the existing diverse models and thus make a standardized u-city model based on each city`s characteristics, such as "industrial city" or "residential city."

The project calls for connecting and integrating u-city services among cities, said an MIC official. "It is also necessary to harmonize the u-city project with the existing urban planning and revising related laws," the official said.

Korea, with the world`s best IT infrastructure, will gain a competitive edge in building u-cities and exporting related technologies, if it successfully proceeds with the u-city project, the official said.

(siyoungh@heraldm.com)



By Hwang Si-young