"Ugh, what is this, I'm busy."

On Jan. 26 at Seoul Subway Lines 2 and 5's Kkachisan Station. As I boarded the lift next to the stairs to go up to the ground level in a wheelchair, a sharp voice rang out. As the stairway narrowed, people's eyes gathered. The lift crawled along at 3 centimeters per second. For 10 minutes, the melody of "Home, Sweet Home" played on a loop from the machine. I hadn't done anything wrong, but my head lowered on its own.

On January 26 at Seoul Kkachisan Station, a wheelchair user experiences using the station to check improvements in mobility for transportation-vulnerable people. The elevator in the photo is completed at the end of last month. It connects from the B5 platform to B1. /Courtesy of Seoul Metropolitan Rapid Transit Corporation

Kkachisan Station has a unique layout with levels B2 to B4 left empty. The escalator from the platform (B5) to the concourse (B1) alone is 41 meters long. Among people with limited mobility, this place has long been called a "cave." As Mayor Oh Se-hoon's "one station, one route" project neared completion, light began to shine into the cave.

◇ A 30-minute route cut to 3 minutes

Following the existing route, the path to the surface for a wheelchair user is little different from a slog.

From B5, you have to take a lift up to B4, then transfer to an elevator. At B1, to reach the surface, you have to use another lift again.

Route guide from the Kkachisan Station Line 5 platform to the ground. The red arrows show the existing route: take the wheelchair lift from B5 to B4, then the elevator from B4 to B1, and then continue from B1 to the ground. The light-blue arrows show the new route: take the elevator from the ground and then use the adjacent elevator that links B1 and B5. /Courtesy of Seoul Metropolitan Rapid Transit Corporation (edited)

First, I called a station employee to take the lift to B4. The wait alone was about three minutes. It took four minutes for the lift to go up one level. From B4, after taking an elevator to B1, there was a staircase to the exit 18 meters high. I took the lift again there. The lift moved at the same pace for 10 minutes.

Those 10 minutes felt especially long. People hurrying up and down the stairs showed discomfort at the suddenly narrowed passage. This is the everyday scene that people with disabilities who use wheelchairs have faced.

It took about 20 minutes from B5 to the surface. It was short only because the lift happened to be on the boarding side. If it had been on the other side, another 10 minutes would have been added, bringing the total to 30 minutes. There is also an elevator connecting B1 and the surface, but the distance between elevators is 160 meters, making it hard to use. A Kkachisan Station official said, "This route is the shortest one available," adding, "On average, it takes about 30 minutes."

On January 26 at Kkachisan Station, the wheelchair lift at Exit 2 operates to reach the ground. It takes 10 minutes on the lift to get outside. /Courtesy of Seoul Metropolitan Rapid Transit Corporation

By contrast, I tried the newly built one station, one route. I took the surface elevator down to B1, transferred to the newly installed elevator, and arrived directly at the B5 platform. Including wait time, it took just over three minutes. That saves 27 minutes one way and close to an hour round trip. It also freed me from the psychological burden and stares I felt while using the lift.

◇ 180 billion won over 18 years… fruits of "walking with the vulnerable"

The one station, one route project is a long-term initiative that began in 2007 when Mayor Oh announced a comprehensive plan to expand subway mobility facilities. From 2008 over 18 years, 175.1 billion won was invested to improve routes at 79 stations.

Seoul City advances the One Station, One Route project at Kkachisan Station and designs using a ㄷ-shaped aboveground non-open-cut method to suit the terrain. However, extremely hard bedrock appears during construction, delaying the work by one year. The photo shows the process of cutting the ultra-hard bedrock, with sparks flying during breaking. /Courtesy of Seoul Metropolitan Government

Kkachisan Station is the last station of this project. The Seoul Metropolitan Government invested 30 billion won to create a "three-minute" route. It was hard to secure space to install elevators because the area is crowded with shops and a traditional market. In the end, a high-difficulty method was used, digging next to the existing elevator to connect directly from the surface to B5 (a ㄷ-shaped surface non-open-cut method).

The construction process was not easy. During excavation, "ultra-high-strength extremely hard rock" was found, far harder than indicated by the geologic survey at the design stage. A Seoul city civil engineering official said, "In a narrow space, we repeatedly broke the bedrock piece by piece and carried the fragments out by hand." As a result, construction was delayed by a year, and the cost rose to four to five times the usual installation cost. Construction was completed on Dec. 29 last year.

Oh Se-hoon, Mayor of Seoul, poses with singer Song Ji-eun and her husband Park Wi holding a One Station, One Route completion placard at the celebration event for securing One Station, One Route across all stations at Kkachisan Station in Gangseo-gu, Seoul, on the afternoon of December 29, 2025. /News1

Mayor Oh said, "Completing the one station, one route is the result of answering citizens' demands with policy," adding, "Mobility is not a choice but a right that must be guaranteed to everyone, and with this project, the Seoul subway has achieved universal accessibility without discrimination."

Meanwhile, the city is preparing season 2 of the one station, one route project. By 2028, it plans to install additional elevators at 13 major transfer stations to reduce the average transfer time for people with limited mobility from the current 23 minutes to within 10 minutes.

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