The Council for Economic Planning and Development (CEPD) says it is considering the feasibility of extending the Danshui MRT line to Danhai New Township (淡海新市鎮) to help accelerate the community’s development.
A proposed elevated Danhai line, a medium-capacity light rail transit system (LRT), would run from Hongshulin Station on the existing Danshui line to Danhai New Township and allow the community’s residents to get to Taipei Main Station in one hour.
Following a meeting on Thursday to discuss the feasibility of the project that also included representatives from the Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MOTC), CEPD Deputy Minister Hwang Wang-hsiang (黃萬翔) said the project would contribute to the new township’s development.
The new community has been planned to accommodate 300,000 residents, but to date only 453 hectares of the community’s 1,756 hectares have been developed, largely because of the lack of convenient transportation and peripheral services.
Hwang said the line would take six to seven years to build and could also be extended to Danshui Station. Provisions also exist for a spur line that would connect Danhai New Township and Fisherman’s Wharf, a tourist destination at the mouth of the Tamsui River (淡水河).
The MOTC has estimated that the line from Hongshulin Station to Danhai New Township would cost NT$9.7 billion (US$310 million) to build. Adding a loop line to Danshui Station would cost an additional NT$2.1 billion, an MOTC official said.
According to a local media report, the project had been previously rejected by the MOTC over concerns that it was too expensive, but the idea is now being revived because of the upcoming municipal elections.
Officials from both the CEPD and MOTC, however, told the Central News Agency that the report was wrong on both counts.
The MOTC did ask for additions to an initial project plan, but it had not turned it down and the MOTC’s evaluation has followed a schedule unrelated to election activities, an MOTC official said.
Taipei County, which is to be upgraded to a special municipality called Sinbei City (新北市), will elect a new mayor later this year.
A CEPD official said the light-rail project would contribute to Danhai New Township’s development, but other supplementary measures would also be needed to boost services and entice more people to move to the community.
Hwang said the MOTC would include a neighborhood development plan as part of the project and would submit it to the CEPD for review.
If the project is approved by the CEPD, it will then be submitted to the Executive Yuan for approval, Hwang said.
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
RSS