It is always great to give soldiers their own room if reasonable:

When soldiers shared barracks rooms in South Korea in the 1950s and ’60s, they didn’t have 300 pounds of gear apiece and a 42-inch plasma television to cram into their quarters.

Today’s Army standard is a 160-square-foot room for each soldier, said officials at U.S. Army Garrison-Red Cloud, a collection of bases from north of Seoul to the Demilitarized Zone.

Some of the buildings within the garrison, also known as Area I, were built in the ’50s and ’60s to a smaller standard. Junior enlisted soldiers are sharing those rooms in some cases.

Giving those soldiers their own spaces would improve the soldier readiness and quality of life, a panel of soldiers at the Army Family Action Plan Conference said Wednesday.

Although commanders for the most part stayed out of the panel discussions so the soldiers could speak freely, Camp Casey’s enclave commander told Stars and Stripes on Wednesday that private rooms have been considered.  (….)

Barracks occupancy could fall as soldiers at camps Jackson, Red Cloud and Stanley take advantage of a recent policy change allowing them to gain command sponsorship and live off-post.

The garrison can’t build new barracks because it is considered “nonenduring” under the U.S. Forces Korea relocation plan, which has been delayed several times.

Area I is renovating its older barracks and adding new furnishings but is limited by its quantity of temporary housing, Meisler said.  [Stars & Stripes]

Here is solution I don’t find to be reasonable:

“I think Korea is uniquely equipped to have geographically spaced units,” said 1st Lt. Joyce Jordan of 1st Brigade’s headquarters company.

Jordan cited as examples the 55th and 94th Military Police, which have platoons spread out at various bases.

Camp Red Cloud in Uijeongbu, where about 1,000 soldiers are stationed, is relatively cramped. About 20 minutes across town, Camp Stanley has barracks buildings sitting vacant.

The MP units are a special case because their platoons provide the MP support to their respective bases.  These other units would have platoons living on another base and have to transport all the soldiers to work every morning and then get them back after work every day.  Is 2ID going to hire special buses to do this? Is there money to do this?  Also monitoring the barracks by the unit CQ and leadership becomes more difficult if soldiers are living on multiple bases which ultimately will probably lead to more barracks incidents.  These are just some of the questions that immediately come to mind but I can’t imagine too many commanders or First Sergeants will support having their unit spread out on multiple bases.