Tens of thousands of visitors crowded the Taipei International Flora Expo yesterday, taking advantage of the good weather on the first day of a four-day holiday.
Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) said the city government and the expo’s operational headquarters were well-prepared to control the crowds and handle heavy traffic during the Tomb Sweeping Festival weekend.
“We expect to see about 100,000 people visiting the expo every day in the next four days, and we are ready to handle all situations that come with the huge crowd. I am confident about maintaining the quality of the expo’s operation,” he said yesterday at the expo’s Yuanshan Park area.
As of 6pm yesterday, the number of visitors to the expo surpassed 70,000, bringing the total number of visitors to the event since Nov. 6 to more than 6.9 million.
Expo spokeswoman Ma Chien-hui (馬千惠) said the expo assigned 3,000 workers and volunteers to help visitors at the expo and around the Yuanshan MRT Station.
TRANSPORTATION
Taipei City’s Department of Transportation increased the number of shuttle buses running to the expo venues to 143 per day. If the number of visitors reaches 150,000 on the day, the MRT trains will skip Yuanshan Station and stop at Jiantan Station instead to control the number of visitors to the expo.
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday also visited the expo to welcome 100 families with three or more children that were invited by the Ministry of the Interior to tour the expo.
Ma touted the government’s measures to boost the nation’s birthrate, including subsidies for families with newborns and free pre-school education for children under five years old, while inviting all families to visit the expo.
MILESTONE
The total number of visitors to the expo was expected to reach 7 million today or tomorrow, and to celebrate the milestone, the organizers will hold a series of activities from magic shows to a raffle with prizes.
The expo’s general producer, Ting See-you (丁錫鏞), said the operational headquarters was confident that the expo could meet its goal of attracting 8 million visitors with only 24 days remaining until the event ends on April 25.
He said about 2.1 million sold tickets had not yet been used, and urged people holding pre-sale tickets to the expo to visit as soon as possible.
On Feb. 27, the number of visitors to the expo set a daily record of 150,666.
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