Land ministry fines Seoul Metro, others W252.5m for railway safety violations

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport said Thursday it had voted to impose a combined 252.5 million won ($188,000) in fines on railway operators and maintenance organizations for five violations of the Railway Safety Act, following a disciplinary review committee held in Seoul that afternoon.

The violations covered by the fines include a repeated failure to comply with a corrective order and four cases of unauthorized changes to railway vehicle maintenance organizations.

Seoul Metro was at the center of the most serious case. The company had received a corrective order in October last year requiring it to ensure proper reporting of incidents, after trains on Line 7 ran past stop signals without authorization at Taereung Ipgu Station in March 2024, at Changdong Depot in November 2024, and at Apgujeong Station in January 2025. Despite that order, a near-accident occurred in February this year at Seoul National University Station, when a signal operator illegally altered a circuit to display a proceed signal even though a track switch was in an abnormal state. Seoul Metro failed to report the near-accident as required under the Railway Safety Act.

Because the company failed without justifiable cause to comply with the corrective order issued under Article 8, Paragraph 3 of the Railway Safety Act, the ministry voted to impose a fine of 240 million won on Seoul Metro.

Four maintenance organizations, including Korea Railroad Corporation, also drew fines for carrying out maintenance work through altered organizations without obtaining the required change certification or filing change notifications with the ministry when their maintenance personnel changed.

The violations were found to breach Article 38-7, Paragraph 2 of the Railway Safety Act and related provisions of its enforcement rules. Metrotech was fined 5 million won, while Korea Railroad Corporation, Korea Railway Vehicle Engineering and Yujin Vehicle were each fined 2.5 million won.

Separately, the committee voted on administrative actions against 35 railway workers who had been fined for Railway Safety Act violations including mobile phone use while on duty. Three workers received license suspensions and 32 received formal warnings.

The decisions, reached Wednesday, will be pre-notified to the parties concerned and finalized after a period for collecting final opinions.

Jo Seong-gyun, the ministry's railway safety policy director, said compliance with the Railway Safety Act and safety regulations by railway operators is an essential condition for protecting the safety of the public and railway workers, and that the ministry would respond strictly to such violations. "We will continue to monitor and supervise to prevent similar cases from recurring," Jo said.