Express train tickets to Taitung and Hualien during the first two days of the Lunar New Year holiday were sold out by noon yesterday, the Taiwan Railway Administration (TRA) said.
The TRA opened the booking session for eastbound trains at 6am yesterday. By 4pm, 369,119 tickets had been sold.
The Lunar New Year holiday begins on Feb. 2, Lunar New Year’s Eve, and ends on Feb. 6.
Photo: Lin Hsin-han, Taipei Times
More than 36,000 tickets were sold within a minute, setting a record, it said.
The TRA said tickets for Tzuchiang-class trains between Taipei City and Taitung departing on Feb. 1 and Feb. 3 were sold out by 11:30am. Meanwhile, tickets for Tzuchiang-class trains leaving before noon on Feb. 2 were also sold out.
Some seats are still available for trains operating on the South Railway Link, which goes from Greater Kaohsiung to Taitung.
The situation for trains bound for Hualien was similar, with the TRA saying passengers who had reserved tickets had to claim them today or the reservations would be canceled.
People who failed to make a booking yesterday could try again tomorrow, when some seats could become available because of canceled reservations.
The booking session for southbound trains operating along the west coast will begin at 6am today, the TRA said.
Meanwhile, the TRA awarded a contract to build commuter trains to Taiwan Rolling Stock Co (TRSC), whose bid for the project was NT$15.4 billion (US$531 million).
The terms of the contract require TRSC to deliver 296 commuter train cars by July 2015, with the first delivery set for next year.
Ho Hsien-lin (何獻霖), director of the TRA’s department of mechanical engineering, said the TRA held 11 bidding sessions before the deal was finalized yesterday.
“It was like the series of revolutions organized by Dr Sun Yat-sen (孫逸仙) to establish the Republic of China,” he said. “[Sun] failed 10 times and did not succeed until the 11th time.”
Few train car manufacturers abroad were interested in bidding for the TRA contract because of the relatively small order, the operator said, adding that the new train would be designed to operate at speeds up to 210kph.
Each train will have eight train cars and four lavatories. It will also be equipped with facilities for disabled passengers and those carrying children. Each train will have space in the cabin for eight bicycles.
The TRA is planning to use the new train cars to replace some of its older cars and will also deploy some on the Shalun (沙崙) and Neiwan (內灣) branch lines connecting TRA and Taiwan High Speed Rail stations.
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