The Freeway No. 7 project is to go into a second-phase review process, despite a previous Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) meeting suggesting otherwise, the EIA General Assembly concluded yesterday.
An EIA specialist meeting late last month suggested the project, proposed by the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, to build a 23km stretch of freeway from the Renwu (仁武) interchange to Kaohsiung Harbor, was inappropriate.
Environmental groups criticized the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) for allegedly altering the meeting’s conclusions by adding the option of having it “go for a second phase EIA review” — an accusation the agency denied.
At the EIA General Assembly, the convener of the previous meeting of environmental specialists said that they were concerned about the negative impact from air and noise pollution on nearby residents, damage to the landscape and to the habitat of birds of prey, while also raising questions about whether the project would improve traffic congestion on National Freeway No. 1.
However, National Freeway Bureau Director-General Tseng Dar-jen (曾大仁) said that the freeway project is important for access to Kaohsiung Harbor as National Freeway No. 1 has reached its capacity and will need the new stretch to disperse traffic flow. The project would not necessarily cause significant negative impact to the environment, he added.
Kaohsiung Civil Servant Citizen Watch member Lee Chung-chi (李重志) said that there is no way to estimate the amount of traffic relief the new freeway project would produce, because the operating model of the planned “free economic pilot zone” is still unclear and that spending an average of more than NT$2.6 billion per kilometer of freeway is too expensive.
Frank Yang (楊俊朗), a researcher with Citizen of the Earth, Taiwan, said the freeway would cause air and noise pollution, as it plans to cut through Fengshan (鳳山) — one of the very few green spaces in Greater Kaohsiung.
Following a vote, the EIA General Assembly concluded the case would go forward for a second-phase review process.
‘NON-RED’: Taiwan and Ireland should work together to foster a values-driven, democratic economic system, leveraging their complementary industries, Lai said President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday expressed hopes for closer ties between Taiwan and Ireland, and that both countries could collaborate to create a values-driven, democracy-centered economic system. He made the remarks while meeting with an Irish cross-party parliamentary delegation visiting Taiwan. The delegation, led by John McGuinness, deputy speaker of the Irish house of representatives, known as the Dail, includes Irish lawmakers Malcolm Byrne, Barry Ward, Ken O’Flynn and Teresa Costello. McGuinness, who chairs the Ireland-Taiwan Parliamentary Friendship Association, is a friend of Taiwan, and under his leadership, the association’s influence has grown over the past few years, Lai said. Ireland is
FINAL COUNTDOWN: About 50,000 attended a pro-recall rally yesterday, while the KMT and the TPP plan to rally against the recall votes today Democracy activists, together with arts and education representatives, yesterday organized a motorcade, while thousands gathered on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei in the evening in support of tomorrow’s recall votes. Recall votes for 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers and suspended Hsinchu City mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) are to be held tomorrow, while recall votes for seven other KMT lawmakers are scheduled for Aug. 23. The afternoon motorcade was led by the Spring Breeze Culture and Arts Foundation, the Tyzen Hsiao Foundation and the Friends of Lee Teng-hui Association, and was joined by delegates from the Taiwan Statebuilding Party and the Taiwan Solidarity
An SOS message in a bottle has been found in Ireland that is believed to have come from the Taiwanese captain of fishing vessel Yong Yu Sing No. 18 (永裕興18號), who has been missing without a trace for over four years, along with nine Indonesian crew members. The vessel, registered to Suao (蘇澳), went missing near Hawaii on Dec. 30, 2020. The ship has since been recovered, but the 10 crew members have never been found. The captain, surnamed Lee (李), is believed to have signed the note with his name. A post appeared on Reddit on Tuesday after a man
A saleswoman, surnamed Chen (陳), earlier this month was handed an 18-month prison term for embezzling more than 2,000 pairs of shoes while working at a department store in Tainan. The Tainan District Court convicted Chen of embezzlement in a ruling on July 7, sentencing her to prison for illegally profiting NT$7.32 million (US$248,929) at the expense of her employer. Chen was also given the opportunity to reach a financial settlement, but she declined. Chen was responsible for the sales counter of Nike shoes at Tainan’s Shinkong Mitsukoshi Zhongshan branch, where she had been employed since October 2019. She had previously worked
RSS