There are currently two political agendas that will have a grave impact on the sustainable development of the east-coast counties of Hualien and Taitung, although they are drawing little attention now. Environmental assessment work for planned improvements to the Suao-Hualien Highway has just started, while a draft law on the development of the east coast passed its second reading during the last session of the legislature.
Ever since these two construction projects were first proposed, and now as they are being pushed through, they have been closely linked with competition for political territory between the various parties and factions.
Under pressure from local political figures, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) have both called for environmental assessment work for the Suao-Hualien Highway improvement project to be completed by the end of this year, and for construction to start early next year.
As for the east coast development act, the motivation for proposing it in the first place had to do with grabbing political territory in Hualien County. That is why we see the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) competing to add their own input to the draft law, while declaring their intention to see it pass its third reading during the current legislative session.
Both projects involve highly contentious issues. If they are hastily pushed through within a given deadline, for the sake of electoral advantage, the “improved” Suao-Hualien Highway will be thrust into Hualien and Taitung like a bayonet, while the east coast development act will eat away at the foundations of sustainable development in Hualien and Taitung counties from inside. The combined effects of these projects will be an unprecedented assault on the environment in the two counties.
The avowed purpose of the highway improvement project is “safety,” which is supposed to be achieved by digging a series of long tunnels. In reality, however, safety cannot be achieved through engineering and technology alone. The greatest threat to safety on the Suao-Hualien Highway is not rockfalls and landslides, but the unending stream of heavy trucks carrying sand, gravel and rocks. Figures indicate that such trucks account for nearly 60 percent of traffic on the Suao-Hualien road.
In other words, if the problem could be addressed from the point of view of industrial and transport policy, the service provided by the existing highway could be greatly improved. In fact the Ministry of Economic Affairs, out of consideration for the nation’s overall development, has already announced that exports of concrete should be restricted.
Besides, government transport departments estimate that trains and ships could carry a considerable part of the gravel and stone that is currently transported by trucks along the highway. The assumptions about transport volume on which the road improvement plan is based should be reassessed in the light of these recent developments.
According to the spirit of the “outline plan for sustainable development of eastern Taiwan,” which preceded the proposed east coast development act, priority in developing transport between Suao and Hualien was to be given to improving the railway service.
However, according the latest assessment released by the Taiwan Railways Administration indicates that although the current investment budget allows for the purchase of 432 carriages to be put into service throughout Taiwan, the North Link Line, which runs between Suao and Hualien, will only be able to carry an extra 12 percent of passengers between Taipei and Hualien during peak holiday periods.
Evidently the support being given to railways — the safest and most environmentally friendly mode of transport — pales in comparison with the enormous budget of more than NT$40 billion earmarked for the Suao-Hualien Highway improvement project.
Current policy is clearly highly biased against railways and in favor of roads. The long road tunnels in the highway plan will be dug extra wide to leave room for further road “improvement” (in other words, widening) in future. The highway project, once completed, will extend the extremely heavy flow of motor traffic generated by the Hsuehshan Tunnel (雪山隧道), which lies on the route between Taipei and Yilan, southward into Hualien and Taitung. When that happens, the nightmare of inevitable traffic jams every weekend will be replayed on the Suao-Hualien Highway and adjoining roads.
The core point is that the development model followed in western Taiwan is going to be copied in the eastern counties and that model is far from sustainable.
The most contentious aspect of the draft east coast development act at present is that the KMT and DPP’s proposed versions both include wording to the effect that land under public ownership may be allocated for different uses by the government agency in charge of that land which can then lease it out to private concerns for a limited period.
The KMT version goes still further by removing limitations imposed by various existing land-related laws. Specifically, it exempts major construction projects from Article 25 of the Land Act (土地法), Article 18 of the National Property Act (國有財產法) and limitations imposed by local government regulations governing the management of public property. The KMT version says that when major construction and investment projects are checked and ratified by county or city governments, they are not subject to the limitations laid down by land use laws. If these clauses are included when the law goes into force, they will severely undermine the system that the draft national land planning act seeks to establish.
The damage will be particularly severe in Hualien and Taitung counties, where 80 percent of land is under public ownership. Much of this land is in environmentally sensitive areas. Once these get-out clauses go into effect, they will greatly relax controls on land exploitation in the two counties. The east coast will then start to experience the type of development already followed in western parts of Taiwan.
Deregulation of land development also involves issues of social justice. Many residents in Hualien and Taitung live on publicly owned land. Over the years, the government has, out of concern for the public interest, taken a cautious approach to the use and release of public land.
However, in the name of development, the rules are now being stretched to accommodate big construction projects. What will this mean for the many eastern residents who rely on the land for their livelihoods?
It should also be borne in mind that public land in these areas overlaps in complicated and inseparable ways with Aborigines’ traditional lands and with those opened up by early Han Chinese settlers. It is foreseeable that, when restrictions on development are greatly relaxed, and in view of the fact that government departments at all levels are trying ever harder to get around the environmental assessment system, incidents like the illegal construction of the Meiliwan Resort on the Shanyuan (杉原) coast in Taitung County, encroaching on traditional Aboriginal territory, will keep on happening.
As time goes by, controversies like that over land enclosure in Miaoli County’s Dapu (大埔) Township will be replayed again and again in eastern Taiwan.
Tai Hsing-sheng is an associate professor in the Department of Natural Resources and Environment at National Dong Hwa University.
TRANSLATED BY JULIAN CLEGG
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