The Ministry of the Interior yesterday approved the Taipei City Government’s long-stalled development project for Shilin District’s (士林) Shezidao (社子島) peninsula with three conditions.
The peninsula is a low-lying tract of land at the intersection of the Tamsui River (淡水河) and the Keelung River (基隆河) that often floods during typhoons. It was in 1970 designated as a development-restricted area to be used as a flood retention basin.
Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) had instructed city officials to hold a survey on the i-Voting online polling platform in February 2016 for Shezidao residents to decide what type of development they preferred for the peninsula. The majority of voters favored an “ecological Shezidao” plan, which was submitted for ministry review.
Photo: Lin Cheng-kung, Taipei Times
Ko, who had promised to allow development on the peninsula during his election campaign, yesterday attended a review meeting at the ministry and gave a presentation about the proposed project.
The project was preferable over one proposed in 2000 that would have raised the peninsula’s elevation by about 6m, which would bury the area’s culture heritage, he said.
The residents are most concerned about resettlement, so the city government would make sure to resettle them before demolition and reconstruction, he added.
The city expects that about 70 percent of Shezidao residents would be able to purchase an ad hoc project housing unit and 30 percent would be able to rent a resettlement housing unit for at least 12 years, Ko said, adding that rent would be discounted according to the residents’ financial status, and absolute household registration would be enforced.
Property rights are complicated due to the construction ban, Deputy Minister of the Interior Hua Ching-chun (花敬群) said, adding that for example one address has seven or eight households with more than 30 people.
The ministry’s urban planning review committee approved the city’s proposal, but added three requirements: The city government must draft detailed plans to protect the existing communities and preserve culture heritage, it must implement household registration and resettlement fairly and reasonably, and it must hold public hearings on the resettlement plan before submitting a zonal expropriation plan for review.
The conclusion of the meeting is a major breakthrough that the city government could not achieve for 48 years, Taipei Deputy Mayor Charles Lin (林欽榮) said.
There are 4,258 households and 11,135 residents on Shezidao, and the city government plans to build about 4,500 resettlement units and provide rental subsidies, he said.
The city government needs to continue planning, pass the second phase of the environmental impact assessment, hold public hearings on resettlement and zonal expropriation plans, and gain approval for the plans before construction can begin, Lin said, adding that the city hopes to start building in June next year at the earliest.
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