SEOUL, Oct. 17 (Korea Bizwire) — The operation of water taxis on Seoul’s Han River for commuters and tourists has been operating in the red, with an average five people using the service a day in August this year, data released by the Seoul metropolitan government said Thursday.

The data, submitted by the National Police Agency to ruling Democratic Party lawmaker An Ho-young for a parliamentary audit, revealed the average number of people using the commuting service came to a mere 16 a day and 492 a month in 2018.

The water taxi business on the river, which bisects the South Korean capital, has been hemorrhaging over the past two years, posting a 500 million-won (around US$421,585) net loss from 2 billion won in sales in the 2018 fiscal year.

In 2017, it suffered a net loss of 700 million won on sales of 2.3 billion won.

In 2006, the local government came up with the water taxi service as part of its efforts to implement a new project called the “Renaissance of the Han River” and began to operate it in October the next year with an investment of 3.8 billion won.

An called for the local government and the operator of the service to map out a restructuring plan to overcome the business loss.

(Yonhap)