The nation’s first light rail system, which started trial runs with four stops in Kaohsiung in October last year, saw the inauguration of four additional stops on Sunday.
The first tram on the extended line departed at 9am from the new C8 stop serving the Kaohsiung Exhibition Center, but there were no long queues, as occurred last year when the trial runs first began.
The newly inaugurated section of the tram line and the C5-to-C8 stops are mainly situated along the city’s Chenggong 2nd Road, which runs parallel with Kaohsiung Harbor.
With the new section and the four original stops, the length of the tram line is now 4.6km, but it is still only part of the 8.7km, 14-stop line that was previously scheduled to be completed this month.
However, because of a financial crisis that emerged in October last year with the main contractor of the light-rail project — Evergreen Construction Corp — the Kaohsiung City Mass Rapid Transit Bureau was forced to delay the completion of the line to June next year.
The bureau said tracks have not yet been laid on a section of more than 1km between the C12 and C14 stops, and a bridge built for the line across the Love River (愛河) between the C10 and C11 stops has not been completed.
The bureau said the free trial runs of the tram line are to run until early next month and would continue with the extended section, while the frequency of the trams is to remain the same, with one every 30 minutes in each direction.
The service hours are to remain the same, with the first trams in each direction departing from the C1 and C8 stops at 9am and the last ones at 7pm, the bureau added.
There is a plan to adjust the service hours, with trams running from 7am to 9pm, and to increase the frequency to between 10 minutes and 15 minutes, but no date has been set for the introduction of such measures, the bureau said.
The bureau said passengers must use the iPass stored-value card for free rides during the trial period.
The line, built mainly along Kaohsiung Harbor, is the first phase of the city’s light rail system, which is to eventually run on a circular route after the second phase is completed.
The light rail system, the first to enter service in Taiwan, is designed and built by Spanish company Construcciones y Auxiliar de Ferrocarriles and runs with no wires above the trams.
The budget for the line was set at NT$16.54 billion (US$508.41 million) and the city government is selecting a contractor to build the second phase, which is to be completed in 2019.
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