A large number of public sports facilities are scattered in residential areas, schools and work places for citizens and employees. Specifically stated, there are 174 stadium-size playgrounds and 294 gymnasiums nationwide. The government is planning to construct one playground and one gymnasium in every city district.
All Olympic facilities in Seoul are fully utilized for various sports activities, boosting sports enthusiasm among the people. Two major facilities are the Seoul Sports Complex and the Olympic Park, both located in southeastern Seoul, just south of the Han-gang river.
The Seoul Sports Complex, occupying a land area of 545,000 square meters, was completed in September 1984. In addition to the Olympic Stadium, the complex has two gymnasiums for basketball and boxing, an indoor swimming pool, a baseball park and warm-up fields. The Olympic Stadium with a seating capacity of 100,000 was the site for the elaborate and colorful opening and closing ceremonies of both the 1986 Asian Games and the 1988 Summer Olympics.
The huge Olympic Park covers an area of 1,447,127 square meters with venue sites including a velodrome with a seating capacity of 6,000, three gymnasiums with
a combined seating capacity of 26,000, an indoor swimming pool that can accommodate
10,000 spectators, and 18 hard-surface tennis courts with a seating capacity
of 15,000. Other facilities constructed for the Olympics include an equestrian
park located in the suburbs of Seoul, a regatta alongside the Han-gang river
and a yachting marina in Busan port.
A key training camp for the country's sports competitors is the Taeneung Athletes
Village, located on the eastern outskirts of Seoul. Built on a 7.2 hectare site
in the midst of a beautiful wooded area, the village has many facilities including
an indoor skating rink, an indoor track and field, a swimming pool, a shooting
range and gymnasiums for wrestling, boxing and weightlifting. The camp also
has dormitories that can accommodate 600 persons, billets for foreign coaches,
physical measurement equipment and a medical facility. The camp also houses
the Korea Sport Science Institute, where advanced athletic training techniques
are studied. The High-Altitude Training Center at Taebaek, a branch of the Taeneung Athletes Village, opened in December 1997. It was designed to provide the specific conditions for high-altitude sports.
In Korea, the 2002 FIFA World Cup was held at 10 world-class soccer stadiums most of which were newly built for the event. They are located in Seoul, Busan, Daegu, Gwangju, Daejeon, Incheon, Suwon, Seogwipo, Jeonju and Ulsan. The Paju National Football Center (NFC) was completed in November 2001 and is Korea's first ever football training facility. The Korean National Football Team as well as other football teams train at the Paju NFC which has a three-story structure to accommodate a maximum of 100 people with team quarters, a cafeteria, conference rooms, and weight training rooms as well as natural grass and artificial grass fields. |