Yeoncheon (漣川) County, located in the central region of the Korean Peninsula, was a major transportation point that the Japanese imperialists put great geopolitical importance on and in which they established the Kyeongwon Railroad (京元線) in 1914. After that, Yeoncheon had enjoyed its fame as a national network during the Japanese colonial period along with Wonsan Port. However, Yeoncheon County had fallen behind other regions after the Korea War (1950-53), and couldn’t help but experience a so-called ‘geographical vacuum’ near the de-militarized zone (DMZ). Especially, the farmland and irrigation condition of Yeoncheon was devastated in the Imjin & Hantan River Basin. The population had also declined in the 1950s. In the present state of the military tension between South Korea and North Korea, Yeoncheon will be per se a local representation symbolizing the peace of the Korean Peninsula like Cheorwon County. This paper has examined that, if we can penetrate through the blocked waterway and railway in Yeoncheon and Cheorwon, we can finally look for the passage to the peace of the Korean Peninsula.

The Imjin River basin (臨津江流域) , The Hantan River (漢灘江) , Flood Disaster , Irrigation Association , DMZ (非武裝地帶)