The Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) line is to stay open one-and-a-half hours longer over two periods during the Lunar New Year holiday, Taoyuan Metro Corp (桃園捷運公司) said yesterday.
The Airport MRT will run from the airport for an additional one-and-a-half hours until about 1am on Friday to Sunday, and from Saturday next week to Feb. 11, it said.
It would also offer extra services from the airport to Taipei Main Station, with local and express trains every 15 minutes.
Photo: CNA
It would also add more southbound services every 30 minutes, all local, to its terminal at Huanbei Station in Taoyuan.
Taoyuan International Airport Corp (桃園國際機場公司) expects passenger volume to peak at about 150,000 on Sunday next week, the last day of the holiday at the airport, which is expected to handle 785 flights that day.
The company advised outbound travelers to get to the airport as early as possible in view of the expected long lines at security and immigration checkpoints.
Peak hours for departures at the airport during the holiday would be 7am to 8am and 1pm to 3pm daily at Terminal 1, and 8am to noon, 2pm to 6pm and 11pm to midnight daily at Terminal 2, it said.
Immigration lines at the arrivals halls are expected to be longest from 11am to noon, 3pm to 4pm, 6pm to 7pm and 9pm to 11pm daily at Terminal 1, and between noon and 11pm at Terminal 2, the company said.
It said it is working with freeway bus operators to provide an additional 1,200 bus services to and from the airport during the holiday.
The Airport MRT, which is to mark its second anniversary in March, had a 99.96 percent dispatch reliability rate last year, the company said on Sunday in the wake of a train delay on Saturday.
The mean kilometers between failure — an industry benchmark for metro reliability — was 475,000 train-kilometers, it said.
The system had only one delay of more than five minutes for every 2,560 trains dispatched, 99.96 percent of the time, it said.
The Airport MRT transported an average of 63,000 passengers per day last year, up from 56,000 in 2017, it said.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)
EYE ON STRAIT: The US spending bill ‘doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan,’ while also seeking to counter the influence of China US President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a US$1.2 trillion spending package that includes US$300 million in foreign military financing to Taiwan, as well as funding for Taipei-Washington cooperative projects. The US Congress early on Saturday overwhelmingly passed the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act 2024 to avoid a partial shutdown and fund the government through September for a fiscal year that began six months ago. Under the package, the Defense Appropriations Act would provide a US$27 billion increase from the previous fiscal year to fund “critical national defense efforts, including countering the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” according to a summary