Seoul mayor visits climbing-themed kids cafe on opening day

A climbing-focused public kids cafe opened Tuesday in Daebang-dong, Dongjak-gu, Seoul, designed to help children build physical fitness through active play.

Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon visited the newly opened Seoul Family Plaza location of the city's Seoul-type Kids Cafe program Tuesday, touring its play areas and caregiver rest spaces to review operations. He then moved to the nearby Dongjak (No. 2) Woori Neighborhood Care Center to inspect the mobile children's fitness assessment program.

Seoul-type Kids Cafes are publicly run play facilities available at low cost. The Seoul Family Plaza location serves children ages 5 to 12 and is equipped with digital climbing walls and tree-climbing structures.

Beyond the newly opened Seoul Family Plaza location, the city plans to expand the Seoul-type Kids Cafe program with a wider range of indoor and outdoor formats.

Oh also observed the mobile children's fitness assessment program at the Dongjak (No. 2) Woori Neighborhood Care Center, which shares a building with the kids cafe, and took part in a fitness measurement session.

The mobile children's fitness assessment program is linked to the city's "Seoul Ai Deundeunhan Kki" meal support project, which runs during school vacations, providing elementary school students with lunch, childcare, fitness assessments and personalized exercise consultations.

During the summer break, when extreme heat makes outdoor activities difficult, children at participating childcare facilities can join the fitness program without a separate registration.

The city has been running the mobile fitness assessment program at seven Woori Neighborhood Care Centers since late July and plans to expand operations going forward.

"For growing children, joyfully moving their bodies and experiencing a variety of physical activities will serve as an important foundation for healthy development," Oh said.

He added that the city would "expand everyday child health infrastructure — where play, care and health management connect naturally, as with the Seoul-type Kids Cafe and the mobile children's fitness program — so that children can look after their health close to their daily lives."