Yongsan expands cooling centers for delivery workers as temperatures soar

A cooling shelter for delivery workers in Seoul’s Yongsan District. Courtesy of Yongsan District Office

For the thousands of delivery couriers, postal workers and gig laborers weaving through the dense, steep alleys of Seoul, the arrival of the summer season brings an increasingly perilous threat: severe heat exhaustion. With concrete heat islands accelerating urban temperatures, municipal authorities are transforming civic infrastructure into an active shield for the city's most vulnerable workers.

The Yongsan District Office said Wednesday that it launched a coordinated extreme heat safety initiative centered at the Yongsan Workers Support Center. The defensive strategy combines immediate physical relief with an unprecedented expansion of operating hours for municipal cooling centers, specifically targeting "mobile workers" whose livelihoods depend on continuous outdoor exertion.

The district has deployed cooling infrastructure stock-piled with 2,000 bottles of specialized spring water, subsidized through a joint campaign with the Ministry of Employment and Labor and the Korea Occupational Safety and Health Agency. Industrial ice chests have been positioned both inside and outside the facility, giving transit couriers access to hydration resources on the fly without disrupting strict delivery schedules.

More significantly, the municipality is expanding its policy on emergency shelters. Beginning in July, when peak heat waves historically trigger severe weather alerts, the center’s main auditoriums will break from standard schedules to open on weekends and public holidays. The move represents a structural shift from passive civil defense to an active intervention in the realities of the modern gig economy, where consumer demand spikes during extreme weather.

Beyond immediate environmental relief, the district is leveraging the seasonal intake to funnel nonstandard workers into its regulatory safety net. The cooling centers will simultaneously host specialized evening labor law clinics, corporate consulting for small-scale operations and psychological support services.

"For those operating on the front lines of this heat wave, these centers represent a critical pit stop for physical survival," said Park Hee-young, mayor of Yongsan District. "We are institutionalizing these labor welfare services to build a baseline of health security for our essential workforce."

This article was published with the assistance of generative AI and edited by The Korea Times.