The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Far East District is overseeing the design, construction, and execution of a multi-year, massive relocation effort currently underway in the Republic of Korea. The move, part of the Yongsan Relocation Plan, relocates most U.S. Forces and headquarters United Nations Command activities from the Seoul metropolitan area to areas south, most notably to U.S. Army Garrison (USAG) Humphreys. USAG Humphreys has grown exponentially over the past 10 years due to projects led by the district.
A key part of this expansion is the development of the land. Camp Humphreys was originally a small military installation but has now grown as the land development and utility infrastructure development (LDUI) plan is completed.
Michael Nyenhuis, an FED program manager at the Korea Program Relocation Office, explained that the LDUI was divided into two parcels for the development work. Construction on both of these began in March 2007. The two parcels were labeled as 2B-1 and 2B-2.
“The garrison is in the bend of a river so that had to build up a huge amount of land because it was really poor soil,” said Nyenhuis. “They had to do all the infrastructure, so they had to put in roads, sewer, gas, storm sewer, street lights, curb, landscaping.”
Nyenhuis explained that both the parcels were completed by two different companies. 2B-1 was completed by Daewoo company, whereas, 2B-2 was completed by GS Engineering and Construction Corporation.
“The 2B-1 project was 819 acres, which is 35% of the entire land area of Humphreys and costs about 169 million dollars,” said Nyenhuis. “The 2B-2 project was 605 acres, which is 26% of the entire land area of Humphreys and costs about 189 million dollars.”
As more units relocate to the area and bring a surge of personnel, developing the additional land was necessary to function properly.
“The place was a maze of detours and construction sites when I first arrived,” said Nyenhuis. “Every road was covered in dirt. With this project complete you can drive and walk around the garrison. Now it’s actually a city in comparison to the multitude of construction it took to build it up.”
Many of the construction projects at USAG Humphreys are now complete and within the next few years most of the final projects will finish up as well.
“It feels awesome to see that we are about to be finished with the entire base, it’s rewarding,” said Nyenhuis. “This next year will be exciting as a lot of buildings are being turned over.”