Seoul's Jung-gu district is seeing strong results from the nation's first safety guideline and crisis manual for managing indoor crowd crush incidents at large retail stores, the district office said.
Since distributing the manual in March, 83 percent of large stores in the district have established their own crowd response plans.
The district plans to continue refining the manual based on field feedback, while providing tailored consulting to ensure all large stores have their own plans in place by the end of August.
Jung-gu has more large retail stores than any other autonomous district in Seoul. With major tourist and business hubs — including Seoul Station, Myeong-dong, Euljiro and the Dongdaemun Design Plaza — foot traffic in the area is consistently high. When regulations requiring large stores to prepare indoor crowd crush response plans took effect last October, the district moved quickly to ease the burden on private businesses, producing a ready-to-use manual and distributing it to stores across the district.
Alongside the manual, the district also offered store-by-store consulting support. As a result, 44 of the 53 large stores currently operating in the district — 83 percent — established their own response plans within three months. A satisfaction survey on the manual (scored out of 5) recorded high marks across all three categories: contribution to manual development at 4.74, on-site comprehension at 4.63, and perceived improvement in safety management at 4.53.
Safety managers at large stores said the manual "helped identify and control areas expected to become congested in advance," that "staff now have a much clearer understanding of evacuation routes and their individual roles," and that it "was helpful in drafting a concrete, site-specific manual."
Jung-gu plans to continue upgrading the manual. Working with outside experts, the district will incorporate a wider range of crowd-density scenarios based on the structural and operational characteristics of individual stores to make the manual more effective in practice.
To that end, the district observed a simulated indoor crowd response drill at the main branch of Lotte Department Store in late June and gathered feedback from participating staff on crowd management situations. Safety managers and other practitioners then held a workshop-style meeting to identify areas for improvement. The district plans to incorporate those findings into full-scale simulation drills in the second half of the year.
In addition, the district will visit large stores that have yet to develop their own plans before the end of August, providing on-site tailored consulting to ensure every large store in the district has a crisis response manual in place.
Jung-gu District Mayor Kim Gil-sung said the district would "further develop the indoor crowd crush safety manual — the first of its kind in the country — to increase its practical use on the ground, and build a safe Jung-gu where residents, tourists and visitors alike can feel at ease."
seouldream01@heraldcorp.com
