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North Korea -> PYONGYANG -> Pyongyang Metro Pyongyang Metro 
PYONGYANG, Pyongyang Municipality To see a North Korean brochure on the Pyongyang Metro in Adobe pdf click on this hyperlink “Pyongyang Metro”.) The Pyongyang Metro, modeled after the Russian subway system, has elaborately decorated stations whose designs are meant to match their respective names, e.g. Hwanggumbol Station, meaning “fields billowing with golden ears of crops”, and Kaeson, meaning “triumphal return”. The decorations include sculptures, embossed carvings, mosaics, murals and huge chandeliers. The Metro was opened to traffic on September 5, 1973. It has two lines, an east-west line and a north-south line, and 17 stations but exact maps of its routes and stations are not readily available. Station names do not refer to geographic stops, but are picturesque or symbolic, e.g., “Victory”, “Glory; “Reconstruction”, “Torchlight”, “Reunification”, “Liberation”, “Paradise”, etc. As the system doubles as an air-raid shelter it is as much as 656 ft./200 m. below the surface requiring long escalator rides in and out. More than 322,917 sq. ft./30,000 sq. m. of natural marble and 430,556 sq. ft./40,000 sq. m. of granite were used in the construction of the Metro stations. Some of the mosaic murals of note in individual stations are: In the Puhung Station there are several murals including: “A Morning of Innovation” (79 x 13 ft. / 24 x 4 m.); “Song of a Bumper Crop” (79 x 13 ft. / 24 x 4 m.); “The Great Leader Comrade Kim Il Sung Among Workers” (52 x 30 ft. / 15.8 x 9.25 m.). The description of the latter states that “… the great leader who, regarding ’the people as my God’ as his motto, devoted his whole life to the people, sharing life and death, sweets and bitters with them.” In Yonggwang Station a mosaic mural depicts “Lake Chon on Mt. Paektu” (56 x 25 ft. / 17 x 7.7 m.). In Kaeson Station a mosaic mural depicts “The People Rise Up in the Building of a New Country” (98 x 11 ft. / 30 x 3.5 m.) In Konsol Station murals depict “A Construction Site of a Blast Furnace” and “Builders of the Capital City”. In Konguk Station a mosaic mural depicts “The River Pothong of Paradise” (92 x 8 ft. / 28 x 2.4 m.) In Ragwon Station a mosaic mural depicts “Masters of the Country.” In Kwangbok Station an embossed mural depicts “Lake Samji in Spring” (230 x 13 ft. / 70 x 4 m.) To see a North Korean brochure on the Pyongyang Metro in Adobe pdf click on this hyperlink “Pyongyang Metro”.) |
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