South Korea begins restoring its section of the Gyeongwon Line

In August 2015, South Korea began restoration work on its part of the Gyeongwon Line, a railway that once ran from Seoul northeast to Wonsan, a port city on North Korea's east coast. The line was built during the Japanese colonial period and was cut when the peninsula was divided and the Korean War followed.

The work focused on the northern end of the southern section, in the Cheorwon area of Gangwon Province near the Demilitarized Zone (the heavily fortified border strip). Trains there had not run for decades, and the track bed had fallen into disuse. Seoul presented the project as groundwork for reconnecting the two Koreas' rail networks.

The restoration mattered because the Gyeongwon Line was one of the main north-south routes that rail cooperation plans had in mind, alongside the Gyeongui Line on the west side. South Korean leaders have repeatedly described linking these routes as a way to build trust with the North and, in the longer term, to connect South Korea by rail to the Eurasian continent. Progress has depended heavily on the state of inter-Korean relations, which have swung between engagement and tension since then.