Shopping for cheap electronic products or secondhand books in the cramped and unkempt Guanghua Market previously located in the underbelly of the Guanghua overpass was a unique experience for many Taiwanese and foreigners alike.
The grungy environment and the experience of being shoved and elbowed by hundreds of shoppers did nothing to stop Guanghua from becoming one of the largest secondhand book and electronics markets in Taiwan.
It wasn't until the Taipei City Government demolished the Guanghua bridge and the old market last year with plans to relocate the stores that vendors began to worry that the new modern shopping mall will scare shoppers away and make Guanghua the next Jiancheng Circle -- Taipei's oldest night market that was forced to shut down this July after the city government's reconstruction project failed to attract crowds.
"I look forward to moving to the new building, but I am also very worried. Business has dropped 30 percent since we moved to the temporary location, and I don't expect it to get better in the new place," said Chu Hung Hsiu-ching (朱洪繡靜), whose electronics shop has been in the market for more than 20 years.
After the old market was torn down, the Taipei City Market Administration Office of the Economic Development Department moved a total of 196 stores to a temporary location 500m from the original market on the intersection of Civic Boulevard and Jinshan Road, and will relocate the stores to a 7-story mall next May.
Lin Sheng-chung (林聖忠), commissioner of the department, said the bridge and old market were demolished due to public safety concerns. With the relocation of the stores, both store owners and customers will enjoy a clean and more spacious shopping environment.
"We want to transform the traditional operating model of the market," he said.
According to the department, the first floor of the new building will be a lobby used to display electronic products or as a food court. Stores will be located on the second and third floor, while the underground floor will provide more than 80 parking spaces.
During an inspection tour of the market last week, Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (
"The shopping environment of the original market was neither comfortable nor safe. The new mall provides bigger and cleaner spaces ? I don't think the market will become another Jiancheng Circle. The stores have survived for years," he said.
Most store owners, however, did not share Ma's optimism about the market's future.
Hsieh Hsin-feng (謝新鋒), owner of a computer accessory store, told the Taipei Times that business at his store had dropped approximately 50 percent after moving to the temporary location. The decline of business has made not only him, but most of the owners, afraid of relocating to the new mall.
"I don't think the situation will be as bad as the Jiancheng Circle, but I am still worried ? Many customers told me that they were used to shopping in the old market. I fear that they won't come to the new mall," he said.
Chu said the design of the temporary location, which houses stores in four separate trailer houses, has failed to attract as many shoppers as in old market.
"I hope that the city government will have a better design for the new mall and make it easier for customers to find what they want," she said.
Ko Rui-tai (柯瑞泰), head of the market's organizational committee, complained that the overall business at the stores has been in decline since the city government stepped in to renovate the market.
While the store owners wish to move to the first floor in the new mall, Ko said the city government insists that the stores should be on the second and third floor.
"The city government left no room for discussion. Business will be worse if the stores are not on the first floor," he said.
Opened as part of a city government plan to rid sidewalks of vendors, the market was originally intended for secondhand book and antiques vendors.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater