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Cabinet touts end to flooding `nightmare'

Residents in Taipei County's Rueifang (瑞芳) and Sijhih (汐止) Townships will no longer suffer from flooding now that the Yuanshanzih Sluiceway (員山子分洪道) is completed, the Cabinet's Water Resources Agency said yesterday. The agency made the confident assessment after the sluiceway performed well through two typhoons -- Haitang and Matsa.

"The sluiceway worked, and helped distribute rainfall during the two recent typhoons' pummeling of northern Taiwan," said Joses Wu (吳約西), secretary-general of the agency. "So we can announce the end of Rueifang and Hsichih residents' nightmare."

Rueifang and Hsichih Townships have been notorious for constant flooding every time typhoons tore through the areas in the past few years, due to the extraordinary curves of the Keelung River.

In addition to dredging and straightening the river, the agency also built the Yuanshanzih Sluiceway to help redirect run-off to the sea.

The construction began in June 2002 and was completed this June. The sluiceway, which cost NT$6.3 billion (US$198 million), had its first challenge when Typhoon Haitang touched down on July 18.

On Friday, Typhoon Matsa hit the nation and became the sluiceway's second challenge. The construction did help prevent flooding and residents' typical battle with the problem was averted.

According to Wu, under normal conditions the sluiceway helps filter out mud from the Keelung River. If the water level in the river hits a high 63m, sluicegates automatically open and redirect water to the sea.

"The sluiceway actually helped decrease by more than 1.5m the depth of the waters of the Keelung River in the Rueifang and Hsichih areas," Wu said. "So we should not be worried about being flooded again in the future."

In addition to protecting the nearly 2 million residents in the Taipei metropolitan area, the Yuanshanzih Sluiceway has been a focus of media coverage.

On Oct. 25 last year, when Typhoon Nock-Ten was pounding northern Taiwan, a local TV photojournalist drowned at the sluiceway's construction site during a flashflood while he was waiting along with other reporters to cover former premier Yu Shyi-kun's visit to the site.

Prosecutors' investigation showed that the sudden floods that drowned the photojournalist came from the sluiceway, which began to distribute and re-direct rainwater toward the group of journalists.

The government has paid a total of NT$570 million as compensation to Rueifang fishermen for losses due to the completion of the sluiceway's construction.

According to the Rueifang Fishery Council, the turbid water from the sluiceway now floods into their old fishing grounds, reducing fish stocks in the area and hurting their business.

After the fishermen complained to the government, the Cabinet's Fisheries Administration paid compensation to resolve the dispute.
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