Seoul

Many people in Seoul ride the subway.

The trains zoom under the streets and across the river. Lots of bridges cross the Han River too. Big airplanes fly from an airport near the sea.

Seoul's first subway line opened on August 15, 1974. It ran 9.5 kilometers under downtown, from Seoul Station to Cheongnyangni Station, along roughly the same route as the city's first streetcar line of 1899. Today the subway is one of the main ways to get around, along with buses and trains, and Britannica ranks it among the best in the world for cost and convenience.

Since the 1950s, about two dozen bridges have been built across the Han River. Trains link Seoul with most cities in South Korea, and the big Incheon International Airport, opened in 2001, lies about 50 kilometers to the west-southwest.

Streetcars served Seoul from 1899 until 1968. The first subway line, 9.54 km from Seoul Station to Cheongnyangni along roughly the first tram route, opened on August 15, 1974; construction had been financed largely with Japanese loans. Britannica ranks the subway among the world's best for cost, efficiency and convenience and credits it, with buses and railways, with easing congestion somewhat, though traffic jams remain frequent.

About two dozen bridges now cross the Han, and highways run east–west along both banks, with a ring road to the new towns. Seoul is the hub of railways to most provincial cities and ports, including Incheon and Busan. Before the Korean War small boats reached a river port at Seoul, but the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea runs partly through the Han's mouth, so goods now move by rail and road. Gimpo Airport, in the west of the city, was joined in 2001 by Incheon International Airport.

Seoul has very cold winters and hot summers.

In winter, it is often below freezing. In summer, it is hot and it rains a lot. Spring and autumn are mild.

Seoul has a big difference between summer and winter. On a typical January day, the high is only about 2 °C and the low about −6 °C, well below freezing. In August, highs average about 30 °C and lows about 23 °C.

Most of the year's rain falls in summer. July alone brings about 414 millimeters, more than the whole of January, February, March, October, November and December together. In all, about 1,420 millimeters fall in a year.

Britannica describes a climate with a large annual range of temperature: January is the coldest month and August the warmest. World Meteorological Organization normals for 1991–2020 give mean daily maxima and minima of 2.1 °C and −5.5 °C in January and 30.0 °C and 22.9 °C in August.

The WMO's monthly totals add up to about 1,418 mm, heavily concentrated in summer: July averages about 414 mm and August about 348 mm, while January has only about 17 mm. Air pollution in the basin has been a serious problem, and the Han River, long highly polluted, has been cleaned up significantly since the early 1980s through water-level controls and large sewage treatment plants.

Seoul has huge markets full of little shops.

People visit palaces, parks and museums. A few old wooden houses called hanok still stand. Many people live in big apartment buildings.

Two big traditional markets, Dongdaemun and Namdaemun, are packed with small shops that serve the whole country. Seoul is also home to many of South Korea's big companies, banks and universities, and its newer factories make electronics.

Housing has long been in short supply, and many large apartment blocks have been built, especially along the river. A few old wooden houses called hanok still stand in the old city. For fun, people visit the palaces, the many parks, and Olympic Park, built for the 1988 Summer Olympic Games.

Services employ the largest share of the workforce: multinational headquarters, banks, insurance and business services, with the stock exchange and major banks downtown and on Yeoui Island. In manufacturing, information technology and electronics have been replacing textiles, machinery and chemicals. The Dongdaemun and Namdaemun markets serve the whole country, while Gangnam, south of the river, has large department stores.

About half of South Korea's major universities and research institutes are in Seoul, among them Seoul National University and Yonsei and Ewha Womans universities, and the city is home to the National Academy of Arts, the National Academy of Sciences and the National Classical Music Institute, which preserves Korean court music. Amid a chronic housing shortage, large apartment blocks have been built along the Han; a few hanok survive near the old wall. The Seoul Sports Complex was built for the 1986 Asian Games and the 1988 Olympics, and Olympic Park holds a sculpture park and an early Baekje earthen fortress.