North Gyeongsang Province said Wednesday that it will hold the opening ceremony for Letsrun Park Yeongcheon on Sunday and begin full operations at the racecourse.
The opening comes 17 years after the site was picked as a candidate for the country's fourth horse racing park in December 2009. It is the first horse racing park in the Gyeongsang region and the fourth nationwide.
About 5,000 people are expected to attend the ceremony, including officials from the central government, the National Assembly, local governments and the Korea Racing Authority, as well as area residents.
Six races will be held to mark the opening, including a special race with a purse of 150 million won ($112,000).
The Yeongcheon racecourse won project approval in 2012 after overcoming difficulties in securing the site, negotiating with residents and coping with worsening fiscal conditions. Construction broke ground in 2022, and the park is now opening its doors.
The facility includes a grandstand with one below-ground floor and four above-ground floors, 100 stables, an animal hospital and a riverside park. The province plans to gradually expand touring race meets from 72 to 180 races before shifting to a resident racing format.
North Gyeongsang Province is also pursuing a second-phase project to convert 792,000 square meters of undeveloped land on the site into a citizens' park, with an investment of 120 billion won.
The Korea Racing Authority and public institutions have invested a combined 654.9 billion won in the project so far. The province plans to add 354.1 billion won for extending the Daegu metro line to Yeongcheon and building a racecourse station, bringing total investment to 1.01 trillion won.
The province will also widen local tax breaks and raise the fund reserve ratio from 5 percent to 20 percent, reinvesting the tax revenue increase generated by the expanded race schedule into a fund to foster the horse industry.
In particular, North Gyeongsang Province is pushing to relocate the Korea Racing Authority's headquarters to Yeongcheon, in line with the government's principles for its second round of public institution relocations.
The province, together with Yeongcheon city, is drawing up detailed plans on site allocation, transportation and settlement support, and is lobbying the central government, the National Assembly and the Korea Racing Authority to win the headquarters relocation.
"In line with the government's principle of linking functions and clustering industries, we will make sure to bring in the Korea Racing Authority's headquarters and complete a national innovation hub for the horse industry in North Gyeongsang Province that brings together production, breeding, training, racing and tourism," North Gyeongsang Gov. Lee Cheol-woo said.
kbj7653@heraldcorp.com
