The Taipei International Flora Expo opened the Xinsheng and Fine Arts park areas yesterday for second-phase trial operations amid complaints about delayed shuttle buses and long lines in front of the exhibition pavilions.
Expo organizers launched free shuttle bus services between the two areas and the Yuanshan Park Area, which has been open for visitors since Saturday last week, but drew criticism from invited guests after the first bus was delayed for about 30 minutes.
Photo: CNA
“I thought it’d be easier and faster to take the shuttle bus, but I’ve been waiting here for 20 minutes with no buses in sight. I should’ve just walked to Xinsheng Park,” an invited volunteer, Chen Shao-ying (陳紹英), said while waiting for the bus in front of the Yuanshan Park Area.
Photo: CNA
The shuttle bus service was scheduled to start at 8:30am, but was delayed until almost 9am because of traffic congestion and lack of a dispatch plan, leaving several dozen invited volunteers waiting at the bus stop in a long line.
Lee Chien-wen (李建文), general manager of Capital Bus, which operates the shuttle buses, promised to begin service at 8am starting today with an interval of less than two minutes.
Long lines also formed in front of the Pavilion of Dreams at Xinsheng Park. The pavilion, designed by the Industrial Technology Research Institute to demonstrate cutting-edge technologies, became the most popular attraction at the expo as visitors waited for as long as three hours to interact with modern technologies including paper-thin speakers shaped like a flower as well as biosignal measurement systems.
Taipei Deputy Mayor Allen Chiu (邱文祥) said the organizing committee would install number-slip machines in front of all pavilions when the expo officially begins on Nov. 6 to save visitors time from waiting in long lines.
Another main attraction in the trial operation yesterday was a water spinach display, which was a subject of criticism from Democratic Progressive Party Taipei City councilors, who accused the organizers of paying twice the amount for a stem that usually costs NT$10.
“I finally got to see the water spinach at the expo after all this talk about its price. I don’t understand why the organizers included such an everyday vegetable for an international expo,” invited volunteer Hsu Shu-lien (許淑蓮) said.
Chiu said the water spinach and other water plants are used in the Xinsheng Park Area for water purification and the cost included maintenance fees.
Organizers were able to keep the number of daily visitors under the maximum capacity of 15,000. A total of 12,645 selected volunteers and guests visited the two areas yesterday, and of 1,182 respondents, 70 percent said on a questionnaire that they were -satisfied with the expo.
Sue Mangiboyat, who traveled from the US with her Taiwanese-American friends to see the expo, said she was fascinated to see the use of biotechnology and recycled materials, such as plastic bottles, in the exhibitions.
Flaws that had been found in the Yuanshan Park Area, including poor English translations and a lack of signs, were also found in the two areas.
Chiu said the organizing committee would fix all the problems before the grand opening.
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