The Taiwan Railways Administration (TRA) yesterday said that it is mulling suspending the sale of its popular lunchboxes out of concern that passengers eating them would not be able to maintain a safe distance from other passengers.
Passengers have been advised by the TRA to maintain a distance of 1.5m from other passengers if they are eating onboard trains due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday that said that if passengers on TRA trains could not keep a safe distance while dining, the company could implement a ban on eating on its services.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
The TRA sells lunchboxes on 50 Puyuma and Taroko express trains daily, and said that it would stop selling the lunchboxes if the COVID-19 situation worsens, adding that in the meantime, it would continue to remind passengers to adhere to the Central Epidemic Command Center’s “social distancing” regulations.
It would give passengers advance warning if it is to suspend the sale of lunch boxes, the TRA said.
Prior to the coronavirus outbreak, the TRA was selling about 28,000 lunchboxes per day, with lunchboxes sold with train tickets or onboard accounting for about 10 percent, it said.
Since the outbreak, that number has dropped by about 30 percent, with the number sold onboard having fallen by about 50 percent, it added.
Considering the plunging sales, a suspension would not have too big an impact on revenue, the TRA said.
The TRA sold a record-high 10.53 million lunchboxes last year. That was a significant increase from 3.37 million lunchboxes in 2007.
The number of passengers using TRA services plummeted by 22.53 percent last month when it sold 525,755 tickets compared with 678,664 tickets in February.
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