The Taiwan Railway Administration (TRA) yesterday said it expected to resume full operations on the South Link Line (南迴鐵路) from tomorrow, adding it would spend NT$240 million (US$7.6 million) to build a new bridge over the Taimali River (太麻里溪) in Taitung County.
The nation’s largest railway service had to partially suspend operations on the main route connecting the southern and eastern regions after torrential rain brought by Typhoon Fanapi earlier this month caused water levels in the Taimali River to rise, washing away 100m of railway embankment.
At present, passengers heading to Kaohsiung from Hualien must get off at the TRA’s Taitung Station and take a connecting bus to Dawu (大武) in Taitung County, where they can board a train again to Kaohsiung.
TRA Director General Frank Fan (范植谷) said the original plan was to make the bridge over the river accessible by Saturday. The maintenance crew in Taitung, however, worked extra hours to repair the embankment, with the Taitung-Dawu section now expected to be accessible three days earlier, he said.
Meanwhile, the TRA plans to build a new bridge over the river, a project that is expected to be completed at the end of next year, Fan said.
“We must completely change the design of the bridge,” Fan said, adding that the South Link was located in mountainous areas, making it vulnerable to natural disasters.
To comply with Water Resources Agency plans to dredge the Taimali, Fan said the TRA would also increase the length of the bridge from 250m to 520m. Rather than a single railway track system, a double-track system would be installed on the bridge, he said.
The TRA said repair work on the South Link after it was damaged by Typhoon Morakot last year cost about NT$70 million. The damage caused by Fanapi is expected to exceed NT$48 million, it said.
A year-long renovation of Taipei’s Bangka Park (艋舺公園) began yesterday, as city workers fenced off the site and cleared out belongings left by homeless residents who had been living there. Despite protests from displaced residents, a city official defended the government’s relocation efforts, saying transitional housing has been offered. The renovation of the park in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), near Longshan Temple (龍山寺), began at 9am yesterday, as about 20 homeless people packed their belongings and left after being asked to move by city personnel. Among them was a 90-year-old woman surnamed Wang (王), who last week said that she had no plans
TO BE APPEALED: The environment ministry said coal reduction goals had to be reached within two months, which was against the principle of legitimate expectation The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday ruled in favor of the Taichung Environmental Protection Bureau in its administrative litigation against the Ministry of Environment for the rescission of a NT$18 million fine (US$609,570) imposed by the bureau on the Taichung Power Plant in 2019 for alleged excess coal power generation. The bureau in November 2019 revised what it said was a “slip of the pen” in the text of the operating permit granted to the plant — which is run by Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) — in October 2017. The permit originally read: “reduce coal use by 40 percent from Jan.
China might accelerate its strategic actions toward Taiwan, the South China Sea and across the first island chain, after the US officially entered a military conflict with Iran, as Beijing would perceive Washington as incapable of fighting a two-front war, a military expert said yesterday. The US’ ongoing conflict with Iran is not merely an act of retaliation or a “delaying tactic,” but a strategic military campaign aimed at dismantling Tehran’s nuclear capabilities and reshaping the regional order in the Middle East, said National Defense University distinguished adjunct lecturer Holmes Liao (廖宏祥), former McDonnell Douglas Aerospace representative in Taiwan. If
‘SPEY’ REACTION: Beijing said its Eastern Theater Command ‘organized troops to monitor and guard the entire process’ of a Taiwan Strait transit China sent 74 warplanes toward Taiwan between late Thursday and early yesterday, 61 of which crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait. It was not clear why so many planes were scrambled, said the Ministry of National Defense, which tabulated the flights. The aircraft were sent in two separate tranches, the ministry said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday “confirmed and welcomed” a transit by the British Royal Navy’s HMS Spey, a River-class offshore patrol vessel, through the Taiwan Strait a day earlier. The ship’s transit “once again [reaffirmed the Strait’s] status as international waters,” the foreign ministry said. “Such transits by
RSS