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A semipublic bus system that failed to stop a strike needs an overhaul

Published: 29 Jan. 2026, 00:04

Yu Jeong-whon

The author is a professor of Transportation Systems Engineering at Ajou University.

In a cold snap that drove perceived temperatures to around minus 20 degrees Celsius (minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit), Seoul’s city buses were halted by the longest strike in their history, lasting a full two days. Buses later returned to the streets, but what further inflamed public anger was the conduct that followed. Labor and management pushed through wage hikes and won an extension of the retirement age. There was no sincere apology and not even a minimal promise to improve service. Citizens were left holding a larger bill.

City buses sit idle at a depot in Eunpyeong District, northern Seoul, on Jan. 14, the second day of the city's bus operators' strike. [YONHAP]

Repeated bus strikes are rooted in a structural contradiction. Railways are designated as essential public services, so legal safeguards require minimum staffing even during strikes. City buses, by contrast, can immobilize commuters without a comparable backstop to protect mobility rights or a practical mechanism to ensure basic operations. For a capital city that relies on public transport, the absence of such safeguards is difficult to justify.

The deeper source of the problem is the “semipublic” revenue pooling system Seoul introduced in 2004. It treats route licenses held by private bus companies as permanent private property, while covering operating deficits with public funds. This hybrid arrangement is hard to find elsewhere. A more common global standard is for the public sector to own routes and assign operating rights through competitive bidding.

Seoul’s current structure also distorts labor-management bargaining. Because the city pays the full bill, operators face little pressure to improve efficiency. Negotiations effectively become a standoff between a labor-management bloc and the city government. Revenue is privatized, risk is socialized and citizens shoulder the burden. In that setting, the spark for another strike never goes out.

President Lee Jae Myung highlighted the core flaw when he asked at a Cabinet meeting, “What kind of license lasts forever, across generations?” The belief that this is a business that cannot fail, paired with predictable subsidies, has drawn private equity interest. Bus firms have increasingly resembled low-risk, steady-return investment vehicles rather than public service providers accountable to riders.

The fiscal trajectory shows how far the system has drifted. In the early years of the semipublic model, Seoul’s annual support hovered around 200 billion won ($140.5 million). By 2023, it had surged to 891.5 billion won. Even after fare increases, the city still injected about 400 billion won in 2024 and more than 450 billion won last year. These figures suggest a framework edging toward being uncontrollable.

Seoul has proposed reforms, including shifting from a post-settlement model to a prefixed compensation system. Yet such steps are patchwork as long as perpetual route licenses remain intact. What is needed now is a redesign that goes beyond the existing frame.

A technological inflection point could make fundamental change possible: the commercialization of autonomous driving. The bus industry has long been labor intensive, with high fixed costs driven largely by wages. Autonomous technology offers a path to turn it into a technology-intensive sector and to rethink operations from the ground up.

Commuters get on a nighttime autonomous bus near Hapjeong Station in Mapo District, western Seoul, on Jan. 21, 2024, the first day the pilot project began. [NEWS1]

Korea already has a world-class public transportation network and strong information and communications technology infrastructure. Combined with autonomous driving, those strengths could enable a step change in safety, efficiency and passenger comfort. This is not simply a cost-cutting device. It is a lever for restructuring a system locked by rigid costs and entrenched interests.

The efficiency gains expected from AI and autonomous driving also provide a public rationale for dismantling a subsidy-dependent policy structure. The surplus generated by innovation should not be captured by a narrow set of stakeholders. It should return to citizens through lower fares, improved service and expanded mobility rights. In that sense, autonomous driving can be a game changer that breaks the shell of an outdated semipublic system and restores its public purpose.

Policy debates worldwide are moving beyond universal basic income to discussions of sharing AI-enabled abundance. Mobility should evolve as well. Every citizen should have access to safe, efficient and comfortable transport as a universal right. To secure mobility for the era ahead, Seoul should begin major surgery on its semipublic bus system.

Autonomous buses could be the scalpel that finally changes incentives.

This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.