Architectural Intervention - Checkpoint, Hub of Transportation and Cultural Exchange
The building proposal is centered around creating an inter-continental railroad system by connecting existing railroad infrastructure. There is a specific DMZ subway line that starts in Seoul and correlates with two different points on the DMZ border. This will be a centralized main facility that facilitates dissemination of smaller interventions throughout North and South Korea. These interventions are meant to be not a place for habitation, but rather a place for mobilization.
Furthermore, there will be additional smaller interventions along the trail that address three key components of facilitation of unification:
- Academia - Educating North Koreans with current modern technology
- Economic Trade Routes - Truck Stops, Factories, Production Facilities
- Tourism - Pinpointing areas where the constraints between North and South Korean are at its most lenient
Politically “Neutral” Zone, or a even a New Country?
This checkpoint facility will be surrounded as a neutral zone between North and South Korea. This potentially “new” country between North and South Korea would serve as a “Middle Korea”, where it can take after the Nordic Model for democratic socialism as a possible liaison between two radically different governmental institutions.
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This zone between North and South Korea would be significant in that neither side’s political bias can have an effect on the meetings within it. This kind of space would facilitate a productive conversation between relevant parties that are involved.
Future Questions to Tackle
- How can blockchain technology facilitate the institutional structure of the Nordic Model regarding politics and the economy?
- Looking further, how can the highways between North and South Korea also be connected and be connected to this infrastructure?
- Supplemented by further research, how would the different programmatic spaces be allocated based on the context of these different sites?
- How would the everyday interactions and lifestyle be slowly transformed from these problems?
