Amusement’s Watery Grave: Songsan Amusement Park Limps Back to Life
By Isaiah Winters.
As we near the upcoming rainy season, many of Gwangju’s riverside residents and businesses are eyeing the calendar with a sense of foreboding. Last year’s torrents, swelled by prolonged and abnormally heavy rains, were absolutely devastating for them. Though some warily stayed put, others already hobbled by the pandemic and then flattened by the floods salvaged what they could and moved on. The sporadically derelict banks of local waterways still tell some of their horror stories today.
One striking remnant of last year’s floods is etched alongside Gwangju’s Hwangnyong River (황룡강, or Yellow Dragon River). Flowing south along the backside of Eodeung Mountain before curving east in the direction of Honam University, this river completely inundated a nearby island known as Songsan Amusement Park (송산 유원지), precipitating its now nearly year-long closure. If you had the chance to visit the area over the last year, then you probably saw what I saw: a jumble of beady-eyed duck boats wallowing in a watery grave.
During the deluge, these and the waterfront cafeteria where they docked were battered beyond belief and then left to fester. The cafeteria eventually collapsed into the water and remained half-submerged for nearly ten months, while the duck and turtle boats lay nearby in various states of sunken dejection until the beginning of May. That’s when I finally managed to visit, apparently just a day or two after the cafeteria had been demolished and dragged out of the water. I feel a little remorse over not getting to see it up close, but that’s life.
That nearly everything has been brought up to dry land suggests our little island amusement park may be coming back to life almost a year after its ruin. Most crucially, the dock will have to be entirely rebuilt and the island’s pleasant, kilometer-long promenade formerly made of wooden planks will have to be stripped out and redone to return the halcyon parkland to its antediluvian prime. This could all take quite some time, given the one-truck skeleton crew I saw there on duty. How the work truck even got there beats me, as there’s no road in and the bridge connecting the park to the trail up Eodeung Mountain remains cordoned off behind layers of police tape.
Among the many others who’ve helped clean the area up are the ladies of the Gwangsan Lily Rotary Club (광산 백합 로타리 클럽). After forming in 1992, these Rotarians have basically been social capital angels who volunteer at nursing homes, assist workers living in rural areas, and even offer beautician services to those without the means to take care of themselves. By their side were a few male representatives from the local Democratic Party who also volunteered to do some of the heavy lifting.[1] Given that the Gwangju News is similarly the sum of its many unsung volunteers, I thought a little shoutout to these good citizens was apropos.
As an aside, there was another amusement park in Gwangju quite like this one that wasn’t so lucky following its demise: Jisan Amusement Park (지산 유원지). The oldest of its kind in Gwangju, today it retains just a few of its former facilities, like the ski lift and monorail. Plans to revivify the old park seem to have fallen through, with the ongoing pandemic doing the place no favors. With nobody to care for it, nature is quickly reclaiming the surrounding valley. Still, the heavily forested road through the park is open to the public and leads to a nice trail up the foothills of Mudeung Mountain, so it’s worth a visit. However, if you do decide to venture off-road to scope Gwangju’s one-and-only permanently abandoned amusement park, be sure to look out for snakes. (For more on that, see Lost in Gwangju in our September 2018 issue).
Resurrecting Songsan Amusement Park, by contrast, is a lot more feasible for a few reasons. For one, it lacks the huge rides that Jisan Amusement Park used to have, making it easier to maintain but also not much of a real amusement park. It’s actually more of a nature park with a few sports fields, a boardwalk, and a dozen or so of paddle boats for rent. The park’s location atop a sediment deposit in the middle of a dangerous river confluence means it’ll likely get destroyed every few years, but the nature of its “amusements” also makes it easy for the place to bounce back. Thus, there’s no reason to doubt a speedy return just in time for this year’s rainy season.
Not surprisingly, since its founding in 2000, Songsan Amusement Park has in fact been destroyed at least twice, with the earlier episode occurring in July 2009. Then the flooding was so extensive and sudden that seven people got trapped on the island and had to be airlifted out by rescue helicopter.[2] To get a sense of how powerless even emergency services can sometimes become in natural disasters, you can see in one of my pictures a rescue boat (구조선) that stood little chance against last year’s surge. The mudline running down its center suggests it first listed to its starboard side before sinking into the mud, where it stayed for nearly a year. To my grim delight, at the bow a severed duck boat head lies in a state of vacant distress as if it were about to be run over. It’s an image that’s got 2020 stamped all over it.
As it claws its way out of the rush of last year’s runoff, I wish ill-fated Songsan Amusement Park all the best. I’ll be one of the first visitors to return once it officially reopens, provided it survives this year’s rainy season. With the last two biblical floods occurring at roughly ten-year intervals, maybe the area can relax a little until the early 2030s. Or maybe not.
Resources
[1] Gi, B. (2020, August 15). 수해복구 나선 여성 로타리안 … 광산백합로타리클럽 송산유원지 침수피해 식당 복구 활동. Gwangju Internet News. http://www.gjinews.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=1243
[2] Shin, J., & Jang, D. (2009, July 07). 광주전남 폭우피해 속출…6천500㏊ 침수. Hankyoreh. https://www.hani.co.kr/arti/society/environment/364388.html
Photographed by Isaiah Winters.
The Author
Originally from Southern California, Isaiah Winters is a Gwangju-based urban explorer who enjoys writing about the City of Light’s lesser-known quarters. When he’s not roaming the streets and writing about his experiences, he’s usually working or fulfilling his duties as the Gwangju News’ heavily caffeinated chief copy editor. You can find more of his photography on Instagram.
Instagram: @d.p.r.kwangju