Hanam & Guri Towers
Hanam Union Tower
Completed in 2015, Hanam Union Tower’s (유니온타워; map) crowns an 80,000-square-meter garbage incinerating complex.
Take the stairs below ground. Find waste burning, sewage treating, and recycling screening facilities. Each day they:
- Incinerate 48 tons of garbage.
- Compress 60 tons of trash.
- Recycle 50 tons of detritus.
- Recover 80 tons of food waste.
- Treat 32,000 tons of sewage.
To counter-program against these unpleasant societal excretions, engineers built a Union Park (유니온파크; map) on top of the treatment plant. The family friendly space includes grass and sports fields, a pond, playground, and an indoor gym.
Hanam Union Tower rises 105 meters over the park and plant. On frigid days, you’ll find white clouds puff from its top (aerial view). That’s the exhaust vent from the garbage incinerator below.
Open from 9 AM to 9 PM (closed on Mondays and holidays), the tower features a multi-level, 360° observatory.
Upon reservation, everyday folks can also take tours of the garbage and sewage facilities Tuesday through Friday.
Guri Tower
Guri Tower (구리타워; map; aerial view) rises 100 meters above Wangsuk Stream (왕숙천; map) north of the Han River in Guri City.
Completed in 2001, the tower is an observation deck wrapped around an exhaust pipe for the adjacent six-story trash incinerator, which can burn up 200 tons of garbage per day.
Guri Tower holds two observation decks, open to the public from 9 AM to 11 PM.
- The first level (30th floor) is a traditional viewing platform with an art gallery and binoculars that let visitors view the Han River, Guri City, and the eastern end of Seoul.
- The second level (31st floor) holds Sky 100, a rotating restaurant serving pasta, salad, pilaf, and more.
