S Korea hopes new rail links will help boost the birthrate

South Korea is launching a highspeed train service that will reduce the travel time between central Seoul and its outskirts, a project that officials hope will encourage more young people to consider homes outside the city and start having babies.

South Korea has the world’s lowest fertility rate and its young people have often cited long commutes and cramped, expensive housing in greater Seoul as the main reasons for not getting married and starting a family.

The government has tried to boost the birthrate through subsidies, with little success.

Officials are now pinning their hopes on the Great Train eXpress (GTX), a 134 trillion won (US$99.5 billion) underground speedtrain project that, by 2035, is to provide six lines linking Seoul to several outlying areas.

South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol yesterday inaugurated a section of the first line, which will cut the commute time from Suseo in the capital to the satellite city of Dongtan to 19 minutes from 80 minutes now on a bus.

The shorter commute “will enable people to spend more time with their family in the mornings and evenings,” Yoon said.

The line is due to go into service today and once fully operational, the GTX will be one of the fastest underground systems in the world, with trains traveling at speeds of up to 180kph, officials said.

Owning a home in South Korea is costly, with median prices hitting a peak in June 2021 after rising 45 percent over five years.

Seoul is particularly expensive, offering some of the worst value for money per square meter of any advanced economy, analysts say.