The nation’s soccer community voiced its opposition yesterday to a plan by the Taipei City Government to convert the country’s only dedicated soccer stadium into a permanent exhibition hall after the conclusion of the Taipei International Flora Exposition.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taipei City Councilor Wu Su-yao (吳思瑤) and representatives of local soccer groups said the city government should keep its promise to restore the stadium to its original use after the Flora Expo, to be held from Nov. 6 to April 25.
They said Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) promised two years ago that the stadium would be closed only “temporarily” to serve as a venue for an indoor floral design competitions and special exhibits during the Flora Expo.
PHOTO: CNA
However, the city government and the Ministry of Economic Affairs now plan to permanently convert the stadium and the surrounding area into a display center for top quality products from Taiwan, Wu said.
“It is really sad for soccer fans that the Zhongshan Soccer Stadium will no longer function as a sports facility because of the Flora Expo,” said Chang Yao-ming (張耀明), a former soccer player who now coaches a soccer team for the Shilin Sports Federation.
Kuo Cheng-deng (郭正典), founder of the Taipei Veterans General Hospital Football Association, also stressed that Zhongshan Soccer Stadium is the only stadium in the country designed specifically for soccer and approved by FIFA for international matches.
“If it is demolished, soccer matches will have to be held at non-soccer stadiums, such as the Kaohsiung Stadium or Taipei Stadium,” Kuo said at a press conference hosted by Wu. “Soccer will therefore have to share limited space with other sports.”
The city government said that it has planned supplementary measures to deal with the issue.
Wang San-chung (王三中), chief secretary of the city government’s Department of Economic Development, said that more soccer fields will be built for the city’s schools with soccer teams.
He also suggested that Yin Feng Sports Park, Bailing Sports Park and Taipei Stadium could all be used for soccer matches.
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. The single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 400,000 and 800,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, saber-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Taiwanese paleontologists have discovered fossil evidence that pythons up to 4m long inhabited Taiwan during the Pleistocene epoch, reporting their findings in the international scientific journal Historical Biology. National Taiwan University (NTU) Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology associate professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修) led the team that discovered the largest snake fossil ever found in Taiwan. A single trunk vertebra was discovered in Tainan at the Chiting Formation, dated to between 800,000 to 400,000 years ago in the Middle Pleistocene, the paper said. The area also produced Taiwan’s first avian fossil, as well as crocodile, mammoth, sabre-toothed cat and rhinoceros fossils, it said. Discoveries
Whether Japan would help defend Taiwan in case of a cross-strait conflict would depend on the US and the extent to which Japan would be allowed to act under the US-Japan Security Treaty, former Japanese minister of defense Satoshi Morimoto said. As China has not given up on the idea of invading Taiwan by force, to what extent Japan could support US military action would hinge on Washington’s intention and its negotiation with Tokyo, Morimoto said in an interview with the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) yesterday. There has to be sufficient mutual recognition of how Japan could provide
UPDATED TEST: The new rules aim to assess drivers’ awareness of risky behaviors and how they respond under certain circumstances, the Highway Bureau said Driver’s license applicants who fail to yield to pedestrians at intersections or to check blind spots, or omit pointing-and-calling procedures would fail the driving test, the Highway Bureau said yesterday. The change is set to be implemented at the end of the month, and is part of the bureau’s reform of the driving portion of the test, which has been criticized for failing to assess whether drivers can operate vehicles safely. Sedan drivers would be tested regarding yielding to pedestrians and turning their heads to check blind spots, while drivers of large vehicles would be tested on their familiarity with pointing-and-calling
RSS