The simultaneous construction of the different lines of the Taipei Rapid Transit Systems (TRT) has thrown the streets of Taipei into wild confusion. It is not difficult for city residents and commuters exasperated by their daily fight with traffic, to lose sight of the benefits that the systems will some day bring to the city and its suburbs. But the different government departments in charge of traffic control and TRT construction assure that there will be light at the end of the tunnel. In the meantime, they urge patience. As Tain Moo-sun (譚木盛), director of the Department of Transportation says, "Let's just keep Taipei moving."
The construction of mass rapid transit systems (MRT) in metropolitan Taipei is only part of a bigger government plan that is looking ahead to the island's transportation requirements for economic development into the next century. It includes a ringlike integrated network of national freeways, a round-the-island railway system, a high-speed railway connecting the major cities running the length of Taiwan, and a mass rapid transit system also for Kaohsiung, the is land's second most-congested city after Taipei.
The northern cities of Taoyuan Chungli and Hsinchu, the central city of Taichung, and the southern city of Tainan are expected to have substantial increases in their populations, and they will also need subways. The plan's long run objective is to open up new territories for urban expansion in eastern Taiwan, disperse the population away from already crowded cities, and achieve an economic progress that is more geographically balanced.
No doubt Taipei needs room to breathe. Actually, congestion of people, cars, and motor scooters, has grown increasingly worse over the last decade. Every day the city's streets carry 3.5 mil lion traveling residents and commuters, more than 500,000 cars, and 700,000 motorcycles. A planned speedy economic development guaranteed mass migration into the city and a greater affluence that would allow people to purchase their own means of transportation. Yet it took fourteen years after the initial plan was brought up in 1972 to begin construction work on the TRT. Optimism warrants that it will be completed in 1998.
C.J. Chang (張家祝), director general of the Institute of Transportation, under the Ministry of Communications, explains the hesitation. "In the past thirty years, most public works projects were carried out according to immediate need. There was no planning and the need for foresight did not seem obvious. The economy was growing very fast, and a limited budget demanded priorities."
When it's all done, will people give up their cars? Estimates on the TRT's probable daily passenger load vary from 20 to 51 percent of Taipei's commuters.
The idea for some sort of mass rapid transit system first came up in 1972, when the Taipei city government considered moving the railroad tracks in the western part of the city below ground. Traffic tended to clog in several areas where the tracks intersected Chunghua Road, a major thoroughfare. However, the city government found that it could not afford the US$250 million to build the underground railway, and constructed flyovers instead.
From 1975 until 1983, a number of consulting companies, the Ministry of Communications, and the Taipei city government juggled proposals between them. Finally, in 1984 Taipei Transit Consultants, a consortium of three American consulting companies employed by the Council for Economic Planning and Development, came up with an integrated plan with three heavy capacity lines, a maintenance line, plus a medium-capacity transit system running from the fast-growing southeastern suburb of Mucha, where the new Taipei Zoo is located, to Sungshan Airport in Taipei.
The Department of Taipei Rapid Transit Systems (DORTS) was established in early 1987 under the city government to take full charge of the planning and building of the TRT. Construction was opened to bidding in early 1988. Bidding for civil engineering was opened mostly to local contractors, while bidding for the construction of the TRT were opened to foreign companies with vast experience in the building of mass rapid transit systems.
The line from Tamsui, a suburb northwest of Taipei across the Tamsui River, was the first to begin construction in early 1987. It is a multinational venture which includes American, French, and German companies. The length and construction schedule of the five lines have been revised several times to accommodate urban growth and its effects on public transportation requirements.
The three heavy-capacity lines and the maintenance line, which will also serve as a shuttle, will have a running speed of 90 kph and a 50,000 passenger capacity load per hour each way. The medium-capacity line will have a lower cruising speed of 35 kph to 60 kph., with a 30,000 passenger capacity load per hour each way. The speed with which people can commute from suburb to city center should strengthen the links between Taipei and its suburbs. All five lines cover a total of 84.7 kilometers, and between them will have a total of six depots.
Planning is also under way for an ex tension of the TRT, to be completed in stages between 2000 to 2021. It will add an additional 50.8 kilometers to the system to cover most of Taipei's surrounding suburbs. Meanwhile, all five lines are scheduled to be completed in 1998 at a projected cost ofUS$16 billion. They are as follows:
Red Line: Tamsui-Taipei-Hsintien
33.1 km, 31 stations
2 depots
Blue Line: Nankang-Taipei Pan chiao- Tucheng
23.9 km, 20 stations
2 depots
Orange Line:
Chungho-Roosevelt Road5.4 km, 4 stations
1 depot
Brown Line:
Mucha-Sungshan Airport11.6 km, 12 stations
Sungshan-Neihu Nankang (under planning) 9.1 km,
1 depot
Green Line:
Westgate-Chiang Kai shek Memorial Hall (maintenance line)1.6 km, 1 station
According to Richard C.L. Chen (陳樁亮), director of the planning division, DORTS, the TRT will initially absorb 36 percent of the daily commuter load of metropolitan Taipei, and is expected to absorb 51 percent by 2021. But conservative estimates from the American consulting companies put the figure at 20 percent, which Chen points out, was arrived at from a different perspective. "Generally, Americans will not give up their cars," he says.
"But we are going to make the system as convenient as possible for our public," says Chen. "Commuters will realize that it will be easier to leave their cars at home or in park-and-ride areas in the suburbs. There will be shuttle buses there to pick them up and take them to the nearest station."
As the design goes, metropolitan Taipei will use a linkage network of bus, railroad, subway, and city bus. And to at tract maximum patronage, the distance between two consecutive stations in downtown Taipei will be about 600 to 1,000 meters, and 800 to 1,500 meters in the suburbs. The mixed mode of public transit is part of an integrated traffic system that will link long-distance transportation with short-distance city transit systems. Within Taipei itself, the TR'F will run along the city's main corridors, and the city bus will cover the supplementary corridors.
Figuring out the fare will also be simple. DORTS is trying to formulate an all-in-one rate to cover transit travel from the suburbs to the subway station. "If passengers have to stop and purchase every ticket along the way," says Chen, "the whole system will be expensive and inconvenient. They won't use it."
But that, as yet, is the least of the department's worries.
Richard Chen ─ "Right now quality of life suffers. But this is only a transition stage, not forever."
Construction on the TRT is way behind schedule, and according to Chen, each year the schedule is delayed is costing the city US$360 million. Already, the construction budget has swelled almost three times the initial estimate of US$545 million from the Institute of Transportation, and almost twice the later estimate of US$909 million by DORTS. The pressure to complete construction increases as the traffic in the city worsens, and as Taipei expands into its suburbs. DORTS is determined to win this race. Energetic digging and building continue from eight to twenty four hours a day in many parts of the city, causing much public consternation. "The only other alternative," says Chen, "is to stunt the city's economic development. "
A severe shortage of local technicians, engineers, and policy makers familiar with mass rapid transit systems, and inter-departmental squabbling caused much of the holdup in the early stages of planning and construction. The lack of skilled local personnel is being solved by joint ventures between local consulting companies and contractors, and foreign consulting companies and contractors specializing in the building of MRTs. Premier Hau Pei-tsun put an end to the infighting by calling monthly or bi-monthly progress report meetings on public construction projects. He chairs the meetings himself.
All the lines converge in the three busiest areas in central Taipei: at Chung-hsiao East Road, the main commercial district; at Taipei New Park, which is near the major national government buildings; and Westgate, the city's squalid old downtown area presently undergoing urban renewal. Construction has been divided into three phases, and ac cording to Hsu Chao-tzung, a transportation planner from the planning division of DORTS, areas carrying the heaviest traffic were given first priority. As such, the first phase will be completed in 1994, the second in 1995, the third in 1998. They are as follows:
First phase
Red Line: Tamsui-Taipei New
Brown Line: Taipei City Zoo (Mucha)-Chunghsiao East Road
Second Phase
Red Line:
Blue Line: Nankang-Westgate
Brown Line: Taipei City Zoo (Mucha) -Nankang
Green Line: Westgate-CKS Memorial Hall
Third Phase
Blue Line:
Orange Line: Kuting-Chungho Blue Line: Panchiao-Tucheng (under evaluation)
Brown Line: Sungshan Airport Neihu (under evaluation)
But even before construction can proceed full speed, DORTS has to make it past two serious obstacles: lack of land, and lack of labor.
The Land Law stipulates that compensation for private land to be used on public works projects should be calculated according to the land's official value. Economic development and its effect on land use, as well as real estate speculation, have led to a sharp rise in the market value of land, and a large discrepancy between the government-set value and the market value. And so the landowners scoffed at the amount of compensation they were offered by the Land Acquisition Office of DORTS.
For example, DORTS began the work of acquiring land in the Tamsui area for the Red Line in 1986. But because Taipei was fast expanding into the metropolitan areas during the economic boom of the late 1980s, land in Tamsui became increasingly difficult to acquire. Although the Land Law recognizes that coercive possession of land by the government for public works projects is indeed legal, DORTS has refrained from doing so. Richard Chen says, "It is not a good solution to deprive landowners of future benefits."
Community objections to TRT construction have also been vehement. Chen cites the building of the Wanfang Community Station in Mucha (on the Brown Line) as an example of revision and delay because of public opposition. Originally, the line was to travel down Mucha Road. But there were already several large-scale public works projects being carried out on the road, among them a sewage system, that were causing residents a lot of stress. Also, the merchants along Mucha Road were very concerned that long-term construction would harm, if not destroy, their businesses. The line will now run through Wanfang Community. Chen says that, since then, Mucha Road residents have realized that they had given up a great opportunity for prosperity.
C.J. Chang ─ "In the past 30 years, most public works projects were carried out according to immediate need. There was no planning and the need for foresight did not seem obvious."
To speed up the acquisition of land, the MRT Law was promulgated in 1988 as a last resort. The new law gave DORTS more flexibility in achieving a workable compromise with the landowners. For one thing, DORTS adds 40 percent of the official land value as an incentive. The landlords may also retain ownership and the right to manage the land. Furthermore, advanced engineering technology makes it possible for DOR TS and the landowner to divide under ground, surface, and air rights between them. The MRT Law also allows the establishment of joint ventures between DORTS and the landowners in the development of the areas surrounding the stations. This arrangement has successful precedents in Washington, D.C., Hong Kong, and Paris. "What is happening now is that both the interests of the private landlords and the public are given their due consideration," says Chen.
Ever since quick fortunes were made on the stock market in the late 1980s, skilled and unskilled workers began to walk out of Taiwan's industries by the thousands. Productivity dropped, profits fell, and schedules became impossible to fulfill. The construction industry was one of the hardest hit. Although the market crashed in mid 1990, the recent jump, albeit slight, in the stock market index has even made it more difficult for construction companies to entice workers to return.
The TRT construction schedule has been revised several times. In fact, DORTS often could not get enough contractors to bid, because they did not have enough workers to guarantee that the work would be completed on schedule. The other construction projects that are part of the overall plan for economic development in the first decades of the next century have been badly hurt as well. According to data provided by the Council of Labor Affairs, the fourteen major public works projects are suffering from a 16 percent shortage of labor.
Solutions to the labor shortage are at hand. Contractors working on the four teen projects are now allowed, subject to approval from the Council of Labor Affairs, to bring in imported skilled and un skilled labor. DORTS has already applied for approval to import labor from Southeast Asia. The Council has worked out a set of conditions for contractors to meet in the hiring of foreign workers, such as enforcing a two-year contract and a minimum wage, establishing healthy living conditions and recreational facilities, and providing welfare benefits.
But until 1998, commuters and Taipei residents will have to contend with traffic and street upheavals. What is there to look forward to when the TRT is completed and running? Maybe less traffic on the streets, urban renewal or growth encouraged by activity in the stations, less pollution, and the distribution of prosperity from Taipei to its outlying suburbs. Richard Chen promises, "Right now quality of life suffers. But this is only a transition stage, not forever."