Behind Pyongyang’s showcase streets, satellite images reveal neighborhoods left behind

High-resolution satellite imagery analyzed in 2026 reveals the true condition of two long-neglected neighborhoods in central Pyongyang: Tungme-dong in Sonkyo district and Worrhyang-dong in Moran Hill district. Hidden behind the capital’s gleaming main thoroughfares, both areas are defined by densely packed single-story homes, deteriorating low-rise apartment blocks, and basic infrastructure in a state of serious disrepair. A Daily NK source reports that North Korean authorities have formally launched what is being described internally as a “capital-area dilapidated district renovation project,” also referred to as the “Tungme and Worrhyang-dong residential housing construction project.”

The goal, the source says, is to tear down and redevelop the most visually conspicuous pockets of urban decay in central Pyongyang, a move authorities frame as the next stage of the Kim Jong Un era’s capital construction drive. Satellite imagery shows two worlds inside one city Tungme-dong in Sonkyo District, Pyongyang, is packed with aging single-story homes interspersed with large factory sites and warehouses, leaving the neighborhood with severely underdeveloped infrastructure. / Photo: Google Earth Satellite analysis of Tungme-dong in Sonkyo district shows a neighborhood that has changed little in decades.

Single-story homes are packed tightly together across the left-center and upper-right sections of the area, their rooftops nearly touching. Narrow, labyrinthine alleyways run between them, bearing no resemblance to the planned residential blocks found elsewhere in the capital. Large factory sites and long warehouse-style structures are interspersed directly among the housing, with no buffer or separation.

Green space is essentially absent, and the density of the old housing stock suggests that road access, sewage, and other basic utilities are severely underdeveloped throughout the district. Worryang-dong in Moranbong District, Pyongyang, sits just steps from the Arc of Triumph