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Hau does U-turn on bus lanes

Three months after threatening to close bus lanes on Taipei City's Roosevelt Road, Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) yesterday announced that he would keep the lanes and would order the Department of Transportation to continue seeking solutions to traffic problems around the locality of Gongguan (公館).

The bus lanes, created in March 2005 to ease the heavy traffic in Gongguan, generated some complaints that the traffic on the thoroughfare had worsened.

However, the project survived a three-month observation period, after transportation department officials and experts endorsed the policy, saying that the lanes did in fact ease the heavy traffic around the area.

"The lanes did improve the traffic around Gongguan, and the situation is getting better and better. Some drivers are still dissatisfied with the traffic, but we will work harder to create a better driving environment," Hau said yesterday in Gongguan, after inspecting the traffic on Roosevelt Road.

Citing a survey of 1,093 residents living nearby, Director of the city's transportation department Luo Shiaw-shyan (羅孝賢) defended the policy and said the lanes should continue to exist, as more than 50 percent of respondents supported keeping the lanes, while only 21 percent said they were not satisfied with their establishment.

A similar survey conducted three months earlier by the department showed that more than 46 percent of respondents said they were not satisfied with rush hour traffic.

"It's an improvement that fewer people are dissatisfied with the lanes. While keeping the lanes, we will consider the role of buses when mapping out public transportation plans," Luo said.

Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Chiang Nai-shin (蔣乃辛), however, challenged the city government's endorsement of the policy.

"The lanes were designed for bus passengers, but there are still 23 percent of bus passengers dissatisfied with the lanes in a survey," he said.

The department said that most of the complaints were about having to walk across the street to the bus stop, rather than people being upset about the traffic situation.

Besides continuing to improve traffic in Gongguan, Luo said the department will extend the lanes to Aiguo E Road to strengthen their effectiveness.

The Roosevelt Road project was launched under the administration of former Taipei mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), and it was the ninth road in Taipei to be given exclusive bus lanes since former Taipei mayor Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) administration initiated the effort.

However, some people claim the design of the lanes, which occupy two of the road's five lanes, has contributed to worsening jams in the area.

While Hau had shared some doubts on the effectiveness of the lanes after taking over the mayorship, he chose to stick to the policy, but added that the city government was still examining the necessity of planned bus lanes on Zhongxiao E Road and Zhongxiao W Road.
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