Costing more than NT$30 billion, the third terminal of Singapore's Changi Airport has opened, and in order to compete, the Cabinet and the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) will invest five years and NT$2 billion (US$60 million) to revamp the Taipei Taoyuan International Airport (TTIA).
In the last 10 years, new airports in Asia including Incheon in Korea, the new Hong Kong International, and the New Bangkok International have attracted the attention of the international aeronautics industry.
New airports provide more comprehensive transport facilities for passengers and goods, increased capacity and an increased competitive edge for the host country.
PHOTO: YAO CHIEH-HSIU, TAIPEI TIMES
Last month, the Cabinet approved plans for renovating important transport gateways in Taiwan, and Terminal I of TTIA received a budget of NT$1.4 billion.
The existing building will be flanked on the east and west sides by new wings and will increase in area by about 13,000m2. The volume of travelers will increase from 12 million to 15 million annually and the new wings will be partially naturally lit, with nighttime light sculptures as a decorative addition.
Another NT$6 million will be spent on enlarging the main lobby, replacing the passport check counters, adjusting passenger traffic flow, improving earthquake proofing, renewing electrical wiring, upgrading airconditioning and sanitation facilities, expanding separate lanes for buses, building a bus stop and connecting the airport to the MRT.
Norihiko Dan and Associates, a Japan based architectural firm, submitted the winning entry for the renovations in a contest held by the Tourism Bureau in 2004.
Fan Hsiao-lun (范孝倫), a team leader of the CAA's Aerodrome Engineering division, said that Terminal I at TTIA will undergo renovations while remaining operational, making the process complicated. The renovations are likely to take place at night during off-peak hours, he said.
A Ministry of Transportation and Communications official said that compared to other neighboring countries, Taiwan has under-invested in its airport.
Asides from investment in hardware, there needs to be an advantageous operations environment, the official said. TTIA's volume is supported by China Airlines and EVA Airways, and ranks sixth in Asia. However, with China's expansion, Taiwan is increasingly threatened. Passenger traffic also requires more tourism, the official said.
As for criticism against the airport, manager Lee Tsang-huang (李燦煌) said that TTIA is taking part for the first time in evaluations by Airport Council International (ACI), and results will be released next February or March.
"I am confident of Taipei Taoyuan International Airport's potential," he said.
In international aeronautics, there are two evaluation bodies: ACI and Skytrax.
Last year, the media erroneously reported that TTIA came 85th in Skytrax evaluations, however TTIA did not enter the competition.
Lee said that TTIA had continually upgraded its hardware, including a new flight time display board for travelers. He said he does not believe that TTIA will perform poorly in ACI's international competition.
The CAA said that comparing TTIA to other airports is unfair, as TTIA is 30 years old. Furthermore, TTIA has the same basic design as Washington's Dulles International Airport and was one of the largest airports in Southeast Asia at the time, attracting visitors from other countries.
Commenting on leaks at TTIA recently, CAA officials said they were caused by construction by the Bureau of High Speed Rail and by typhoons which broke window panes.
Lee said that Taiwan has the unique challenge of typhoons and earthquakes, which occasionally cause leaks in windows.
"We've been doing our best to improve [the situation]," he said, reiterating that compared to airports constructed around the same time, such as Los Angeles, Paris, Dulles and Rome, TTIA is no worse off.
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
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