The final two sections of the 38.8km project to improve the Suhua Highway are to open at 4pm on Jan. 6, the Directorate-General of Highways said on Friday.
The project covers three sections along Taiwan’s rugged east coast — from Suao (蘇澳) to Dongao (東澳) townships in Yilan County; from Nanao Township (南澳) in Yilan to Heping Township (和平) in Hualien County; and from Hejhong (和中) to Dacingshuei (大清水) in Hualien.
The first stretch opened on Feb. 5 last year, while the other two sections would start operation in time to ease holiday traffic around the Lunar New Year period from Jan. 23 to Jan. 29, according to the agency.
Photo provided by Yilan County Government
The opening of the new sections would cut travel time from two-and-a-half hours to 80 minutes, the agency said.
In the first three months of operation for the two new sections, only cars and buses would be allowed, it said, adding that trucks would be permitted following an evaluation.
As with the old Suhua Highway, the new sections and tunnels would have a single lane in each direction, with a speed limit between 40 and 60kph.
Major intercity bus operators have announced that there will be a bus service between Greater Taipei and Hualien once the new sections are opened with tickets priced at NT$300 to NT$350.
The highway, which connects Yilan and Hualien counties, includes many winding sections along cliffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean that are accident-prone and vulnerable to landslides, resulting in frequent shutdowns.
The three sections of the project bypass the most precarious parts of the old highway, mostly through the use of tunnels that would account for more than 60 percent of the new road. The longest is a 7.9km tunnel in the middle section near the Guanyin area.
The final two segments comprise 29.1km of road, 20.7km of which run through five tunnels.
The need for an upgrade gained urgency in 2010, when Typhoon Megi triggered landslides on the road, killing 26 people.
The old Suhua Highway, with its views of Taiwan’s eastern coastline, would remain open to motorists with speed limits of 40 to 50kph.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
A bipartisan group of US senators has introduced a bill to enhance cooperation with Taiwan on drone development and to reduce reliance on supply chains linked to China. The proposed Blue Skies for Taiwan Act of 2026 was introduced by Republican US senators Ted Cruz and John Curtis, and Democratic US senators Jeff Merkley and Andy Kim. The legislation seeks to ease constraints on Taiwan-US cooperation in uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), including dependence on China-sourced components, limited access to capital and regulatory barriers under US export controls, a news release issued by Cruz on Wednesday said. The bill would establish a "Blue UAS
RSS