The purpose of this paper is to analyze the characteristic of building activities referred to building code in the Development-Restricted Zone (DRZ) in Seoul. Through 3 wards' case studies, four characteristics are found: 1) Lots of illegally built buildings exist in DRZ, and many of those were built before DRZ. 2) Except for dismantling cases, building activities in DRZ in general rarely happen, and the land use in DRZ is stable. 3) Extension and alteration of building has not increased so much the area of houses. 4) In most of these cases, the area of altered houses decreased. These characteristics of building activities in DRZ give a suggestion; only easing the regulation of total floor area to houses in DRZ could not mediate the conflict between landowners and government.
