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Hualien residents polled to evaluate support for freeway

Ninety-three percent of Hualien County residents who responded to a poll favor the construction of a freeway connecting Ilan and Hualien, an official of the Eastern Taiwan Joint Services Center at the Executive Yuan said yesterday.

Wu Kuo-tung (吳國棟), executive director of the services center, said the center conducted the survey on residents in more than 170 boroughs in Hualien County last November and the results would be sent to the Executive Yuan for reference.

Construction of the freeway, first proposed a decade ago, has stalled because of its potential impact on the environment along the proposed route.

However, the project has been a focus of heated discussion during almost every election since it was proposed.

Wu said the survey targeting the residents of the county differed from other public opinion polls collected from across the nation.

A total of 260,000 questionnaires were issued, and 84,892 responses were received, or about 33 percent of those distributed. Of these, 78,651, or 93 percent, favored the construction of the freeway, while 6,241, or 7 percent, were opposed, he said.

He said that since the inauguration of the Joint Services Center last September, many Hualien residents and groups had appealed to the center to petition the government to begin construction of the freeway, which they said would solve nagging transportation problems for residents.

Traffic on the existing highway is often disrupted by typhoons.
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