Parents fear Taipei schools may be constructed on active fault

Parents of children who attend two of Taipei's schools located on suspected faults remain unconvinced of their children's safety, despite briefings from geologists and reassurances from city officials.

City officials and councilors visited Taoyuan Elementary School (桃源國?p) and Taoyuan Junior High School (桃源國??) in Peitou to get a better understanding of how schools located on fault lines were affected by the 921 earthquake.

Damage to buildings in these schools was not as bad as one would have imagined, school principals said. Yao Jung-hua (姚榮華), principal of Taoyuan Junior High School, said two massive earthquakes that occurred in 1986 -- with epicenters in Hualien -- had seriously damaged campus buildings, forcing the school to demolish them to make room for new buildings.

The current buildings, completed in 1996 and designed to withstand quakes measuring up to 6.0 on the Richter scale, were left undamaged by the 921 quake, Yao said.

The city government, meanwhile, is to spend around NT$250 million to repair quake-damaged buildings in more than 55 schools in Taipei, said David Lee (李錫津), director of the Bureau of Education.

But teachers in the two schools still expressed concern. Yao said he was aware of two facts regarding the Chinshan fault line (金?s斷層) that passes through the guardhouse inside the campus. One was that the last time the fault slipped was about 300 years ago, and another shift is not expected for another 200 years.

"The second states that nobody can tell the exact location of the fault line, or when and where a quake will hit," he said.

But the principal said yesterday's report by Wang Chien-ying (?y敦悔?/CHINESE>), a geologist from National Central University, left him more confused.

Studies have shown that the Chinshan-Shanchuao-Hsinchuang fault line (金?s-?s腳-新2讕_層), part of which passes under the schools in question, could behave in a number of different ways during seismic activity, Wang said.

"While the Hsinchuang fault has been inactive for a long time, and its unlikely to move in the near future, the Chinshan fault shifted about 300 years ago, a very worrying fact," Wang said.

Data collected from the Central Geological Survey, directed by the Ministry of Economic Affairs, indicates that the four fault lines that pass through the city -- the Chinshan-Shanchuao-Hsinchuang fault (金?s-?s腳-新2讕_層), the Kanchiao fault (崁腳斷層), the Taipei fault (台北斷層) and the Hsintien fault (新店斷層) -- were defined as "suspected" active faults.

When asked by Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬-^?E) whether past research on these fault lines had drawn the same conclusion, Wang admitted that nothing could be certain before further geological investigation is conducted.

"So far, the four fault lines are defined [by experts] as `suspected,' meaning no past documented evidence can confirm the status of the faults," Ma said. "So the public shouldn't worry unduly."

City Councilor Lai Su-ru (賴素|p), who last Sunday talked to parents of children who attend Taoyuan Elementary School, said briefings laden with jargon from geology experts weren't of much help.

"The city government should assure these parents that their school is completely safe. Otherwise [the parents] say they will remove their children," Lai said.