Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) could reduce ticket prices for the MRT’s Muzha and Neihu lines after repeated malfunctions, Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) said yesterday.
Reduced prices could be one measure to make up for the troubles, Hau said, while promising to enhance emergency response measures so that no passengers are asked to walk along the MRT tracks again in the event of another breakdown.
“The most important thing is to rebuild the public’s trust in the Muzha and Neihu lines,” Hau said at Taipei City Hall yesterday, demanding that “TRTC and the Rapid Transit Systems Department handle the issues regarding the lines by prioritizing the needs of passengers.”
Trains on the two lines came to a stop on Friday afternoon after a power outage.
Approximately 700 passengers were forced to walk along the elevated rail lines to get back to station platforms from their trains, which had stopped between stations.
Hau’s promise to consider reducing prices came after Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taipei City councilors slammed the city government over the MRT problems and urged it to cut ticket prices or offer free rides until the system is stabilized.
KMT Taipei City Councilor Chen Yi-chou (陳義洲) and a group of local borough chiefs from Neihu called on the TRTC to cut ticket prices by NT$5 to compensate for unreliability and poor service.
DPP Taipei City councilors Hung Chien-yi (洪健益) and Lee Wen-ying (李文英) condemned Hau and TRTC for treating passengers as “lab rats” by operating the Neihu Line while the system was still in its testing period.
They urged the city government to provide free services on the two lines for at least one month.
Hau said more senior engineers and high-ranking officials from the Neihu Line’s builder, Montreal-based Bombardier, would soon arrive in Taipei to work on the system’s instabilities.
In related news, a malfunction on the Blue Line yesterday resulted in a delay of about an hour after an earthquake in the early hours caused a crack in a cable line.
Taipei City Secretariat Deputy Director Tan Gwa-guang (譚國光), the head of the Neihu Line’s emergency response team and former president of TRTC, answered questions yesterday about the Blue Line malfunction.
Tan said the crack in the cable line had caused trains to malfunction at MRT Fuzhong Station at 6:03am. The interval between trains was then extended from 5 minutes to 15 minutes.
The malfunction was resolved and trains intervals shortened by 7:03am.
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