After some Taipei city councilors thought the Muzha-Neihu MRT line’s slew of mechanical problems might be linked to an unlucky name, the Taipei City Government spent about NT$1 million (US$31,200) in October on new maps and signs to rename the line the Wenshan-Neihu Line, which it said sounded more elegant and luckier.
Hopefully, no Taipei City Government officials really believed changing the name from Zhahu to Wenhu would put an end to the line’s breakdowns.
Given the spate of incidents since October, the problem-ridden line needs more than just some name changes to reverse the “bad luck” that has plagued it since it was launched last July.
The latest to the long list of malfunctions occurred during the morning rush hour on Monday. Service was interrupted for more than 30 minutes, affecting 19 trains and more than 1,700 passengers. The Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said an unexpected power interruption caused the problem.
The breakdown not only dampened what was left of Taipei residents’ confidence in the Wenhu line, but was a slap in the face for President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), who just last Wednesday stood by the decision he made when he was Taipei mayor to make the line a medium-capacity system.
Ma said the Wenhu line’s overall performance during its trial period had been much better than that of the original Muzha line.
“I am confident about the future of the Taipei MRT,” he told Control Yuan members probing alleged irregularities during the line’s construction, adding that he considered extending the MRT system to be “the proudest” achievement of his eight years as mayor.
Maybe Ma, or Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), would want to ask Taipei residents what they think of the line. Are they as proud of a line that cost the city government almost NT$70 billion to build?
The truth is the Wenhu line has experienced multiple breakdowns since its trial period. Aside from the regular malfunctions such as power outages, circuit-board issues and network glitches that have yet to be completely resolved, braking irregularities and reports of a scorched smell have also been reported.
Rather than letting a fluke determine the magnitude of an incident whenever a breakdown occurs and just blaming TRTC or its contractors for their ineptitude, it’s time for the Taipei City Government to take proactive measures.
Suspending the line temporarily might incur a wave of criticism, and worse, deal a blow to Ma and the city’s sense of pride. However, if the city government wants to prove it is a responsible administration that cares about its residents’ well-being, it should stop letting ego — or face — stand in the way of admitting faults and correcting wrongs.
The city must carry out a blanket inspection of the Wenhu Line and tackle all the issues, even if that means shutting down the line for a substantial period of time.
For the sake of passenger safety, it is better to be safe than sorry.
After more than a year of review, the National Security Bureau on Monday said it has completed a sweeping declassification of political archives from the Martial Law period, transferring the full collection to the National Archives Administration under the National Development Council. The move marks another significant step in Taiwan’s long journey toward transitional justice. The newly opened files span the architecture of authoritarian control: internal security and loyalty investigations, intelligence and counterintelligence operations, exit and entry controls, overseas surveillance of Taiwan independence activists, and case materials related to sedition and rebellion charges. For academics of Taiwan’s White Terror era —
On Feb. 7, the New York Times ran a column by Nicholas Kristof (“What if the valedictorians were America’s cool kids?”) that blindly and lavishly praised education in Taiwan and in Asia more broadly. We are used to this kind of Orientalist admiration for what is, at the end of the day, paradoxically very Anglo-centered. They could have praised Europeans for valuing education, too, but one rarely sees an American praising Europe, right? It immediately made me think of something I have observed. If Taiwanese education looks so wonderful through the eyes of the archetypal expat, gazing from an ivory tower, how
After 37 US lawmakers wrote to express concern over legislators’ stalling of critical budgets, Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) pledged to make the Executive Yuan’s proposed NT$1.25 trillion (US$39.7 billion) special defense budget a top priority for legislative review. On Tuesday, it was finally listed on the legislator’s plenary agenda for Friday next week. The special defense budget was proposed by President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration in November last year to enhance the nation’s defense capabilities against external threats from China. However, the legislature, dominated by the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), repeatedly blocked its review. The
China has apparently emerged as one of the clearest and most predictable beneficiaries of US President Donald Trump’s “America First” and “Make America Great Again” approach. Many countries are scrambling to defend their interests and reputation regarding an increasingly unpredictable and self-seeking US. There is a growing consensus among foreign policy pundits that the world has already entered the beginning of the end of Pax Americana, the US-led international order. Consequently, a number of countries are reversing their foreign policy preferences. The result has been an accelerating turn toward China as an alternative economic partner, with Beijing hosting Western leaders, albeit
RSS