Can Seoul’s New Transport Promises Deliver? A Deep Dive into the 5-Minute Bus and 10-Minute Subway Pledges

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Jeon Hyun-hee, a Democratic Party candidate in the Seoul mayoral primary, criticized Jeong Won-o’s pledges to put a bus stop within 5 minutes of every home and a subway station within 10 minutes as unlikely to be achievable within a single mayoral term.

At the MBC-hosted Democratic Party primary debate on March 31, Jeon asked Jeong whether those promises could realistically be fulfilled during one term in office.

Jeong said he would comprehensively reorganize city bus routes and the connecting neighborhood lines. If reorganization alone proved insufficient, he added, the city would deploy publicly operated micro-shuttles to ensure residents could reach a bus stop within 5 minutes. His broader objective is to ensure commuters can get from their bus stop to a subway station within 10 minutes.

Jeon countered that while the proposal sounds attractive, it is hollow in practice and difficult to implement. She noted that Seoul’s bus routes are effectively owned by private bus companies, which makes a wholesale reorganization challenging.

To restructure routes, she argued, the public sector must assume control of those routes. She urged policymakers to consider options such as public acquisition of bus lines.

Jeong replied that acquisition is not the only path and that the city can proceed through contractual agreements; he said such discussions have already taken place.

He added that the city has been conducting a nearly two-year study on bus-route reorganization but has not released the findings. If elected, he said, he would finalize and announce the plan and then move forward with the next steps.

Jeon pressed further on the subway pledge, questioning how a subway could be made accessible within 10 minutes of every home when most new subway projects in Seoul have stalled. She said the pledge is effectively impossible to deliver within one term.

Jeong responded that the proposed Gangbuk and Seobu subway lines have been effectively neglected under Mayor Oh Se-hoon and that his administration would advance those projects. He noted that they must clear preliminary feasibility reviews, and to date economic viability has been the primary obstacle.

Jeon said private investors withdrew from projects because of external shocks — including the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine — leaving planned subway builds in limbo. For a fundamental solution, she argued, legislation is needed to exempt certain projects from preliminary feasibility reviews and to allow private contractors’ subway construction contracts to reflect inflation in construction costs. She said she has already introduced such bills.

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