Renewed talk of building a bridge to connect Kinmen Island with China’s port city of Xiamen has put the sparsely populated island county in the spotlight as it fights to promote a project that seems to have little if any support from the central government or the opposition.
Local media reported on Thursday that President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) had given the order to start the project, but Presidential Spokesman Wang Yu-chi (王郁琦) clarified that Ma had simply asked about the progress of a feasibility assessment on building the bridge.
A Cabinet spokesman later said there was no timetable to complete the feasibility study, a clear indication the government is in no rush to move forward on the ambitious project.
The Democratic Progressive Party opposes the idea, branding it as a step toward unification with China. Even Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators worry the bridge’s construction would divert local taxpayer funds to help China develop Xiamen.
Yet Kinmen residents want their island, a former front line against China, to be transformed into a new frontier for peace by building a road link to China.
Support for the project, called the Jindeng Bridge (金嶝大橋), is especially strong among those over 60 who experienced the month-long artillery bombardment of the island by the Chinese army in 1958 that killed more than 600 servicemen and civilians and injured more than 2,600.
Most of those now dream of “driving a car from Kinmen to Xiamen in a day,” said Yen Chung-cheng (顏忠誠), a Kinmen native who once served as a vice commander-in-chief of the Republic of China Army.
During his stint as Taiwan’s Fujian governor, a now-defunct position once responsible for Kinmen and Matsu, Yen listed the building of a bridge connecting Kinmen and Xiamen as one of the three major “projects of hope” in the region.
A public opinion poll conducted by the National Kinmen Institute of Technology in April 2007 found building a bridge to Xiamen was the issue of second-greatest concern to the county’s residents, trailing only the need for improved health and emergency care.
The 83.9 percent of respondents who felt it was an important issue believed it was necessary to cement ties with China, around which many of the lives of the 50,000 people who reside in Kinmen revolve.
Kinmen County Commissioner Lee Chu-feng (李炷烽) is firmly behind the project, saying Kinmen has served as a bridge connecting the two sides of the Taiwan Strait since direct ferry services to Xiamen and other Chinese ports were launched in early 2001.
“The building of the Jindeng Bridge will not only help hone Taiwan’s bridge building technologies, it will also help boost development in Kinmen itself,” Lee said. “The Jindeng Bridge will facilitate the building of water pipes and electricity transmission cables between Kinmen and Xiamen, allowing Kinmen to import fresh water and electricity from China — moves that would also manifest Taiwan’s sincerity in pursuing peace and co-prosperity with China.”
The Kinmen County Government said 974,000 people traveled between Kinmen and Xiamen last year, up from the 21,000 who used the ferry service in its inaugural year, an indication, it says, of the county’s crucial role as a gateway to China.
Yet that role has been threatened since direct air and sea links were opened between Taiwan and China last December, prompting Kinmen residents to seek further breakthroughs in its ties with China, particularly Xiamen, Kinmen County Council Speaker Hsieh Yi-chang (謝宜璋) said.
Lee said the Kinmen County Government began studying the possibility of building of a bridge between Kinmen and Xiamen in 2004 and has since proposed three different projects.
Plan A is a 10.3km bridge that would connect Wulongshan (五龍山) in Kinmen, to Jiaoyu (角嶼) and Xiaodeng islets (小嶝嶼) and on to Dadeng Island (大嶝島), which sits west-northwest of Xiamen Island and northeast of Kinmen.
Plan B, the Jindeng Bridge plan, would span 8.6km and directly connect Wulongshan and Dadeng Island.
Plan C is a 11.4km bridge between Wulongshan and Fujian Province’s Lianhe, which lies further north of Xiamen.
The costs of the three plans range from NT$12.7 billion (US$377.98 million) to NT$16.6 billion, Lee said.
Lee said Kinmen County prefers the second option because it is the most direct and the least costly.
If the bridge were built, it would take less than 30 minutes to drive from Kinmen to the island on which the center of Xiamen lies, by way of Dadeng, a land bridge to Xiangan north of Xiamen and then a tunnel currently under construction from Xiangan to Xiamen, Hsieh said.
A bridge would further tie the Taiwanese island to the major Chinese port city.
An increasing number of Kinmen youths have also chosen to attend schools in Xiamen rather than traveling to Taiwan proper for studies after the ferry service was opened.
Moreover, as their children went to Xiamen to get an education, parents in Kinmen began to purchase houses or invest in real estate in Xiamen.
Hsieh says the bridge would turn Kinmen into a Xiamen suburb, giving Kinmen residents more convenient links to the big city.
“A genuine one-day traffic zone between Kinmen and Xiamen would be created,” Hsieh said.
Taiwan would benefit from more integrated military strategies and deployments if the US and its allies treat the East China Sea, the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea as a “single theater of operations,” a Taiwanese military expert said yesterday. Shen Ming-shih (沈明室), a researcher at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said he made the assessment after two Japanese military experts warned of emerging threats from China based on a drill conducted this month by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) Eastern Theater Command. Japan Institute for National Fundamentals researcher Maki Nakagawa said the drill differed from the
‘WORSE THAN COMMUNISTS’: President William Lai has cracked down on his political enemies and has attempted to exterminate all opposition forces, the chairman said The legislature would motion for a presidential recall after May 20, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday at a protest themed “against green communists and dictatorship” in Taipei. Taiwan is supposed to be a peaceful homeland where people are united, but President William Lai (賴清德) has been polarizing and tearing apart society since his inauguration, Chu said. Lai must show his commitment to his job, otherwise a referendum could be initiated to recall him, he said. Democracy means the rule of the people, not the rule of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), but Lai has failed to fulfill his
OFF-TARGET: More than 30,000 participants were expected to take part in the Games next month, but only 6,550 foreign and 19,400 Taiwanese athletes have registered Taipei city councilors yesterday blasted the organizers of next month’s World Masters Games over sudden timetable and venue changes, which they said have caused thousands of participants to back out of the international sporting event, among other organizational issues. They also cited visa delays and political interference by China as reasons many foreign athletes are requesting refunds for the event, to be held from May 17 to 30. Jointly organized by the Taipei and New Taipei City governments, the games have been rocked by numerous controversies since preparations began in 2020. Taipei City Councilor Lin Yen-feng (林延鳳) said yesterday that new measures by
A rally held by opposition parties yesterday demonstrates that Taiwan is a democratic country, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday, adding that if opposition parties really want to fight dictatorship, they should fight it on Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) held a protest with the theme “against green communists and dictatorship,” and was joined by the Taiwan People’s Party. Lai said the opposition parties are against what they called the “green communists,” but do not fight against the “Chinese communists,” adding that if they really want to fight dictatorship, they should go to the right place and face