The Railway Bureau yesterday said that it would spend NT$1.13 billion (US$38.12 million) to upgrade the 16 railway stations along the South Link Line by 2024.
The line would become fully electrified by the end of this year, Bureau Chief Engineer Wen Tai-hsin (溫代欣) said in a presentation at Taitung Railway Station.
As the number of passengers accessing the line is expected to increase in the near term, the bureau has decided to renovate the facilities in the stations along the line, Wen said.
Photo: CNA
The renovation project, which is to begin next year, would ensure that each station features the distinct characteristics and cultures of the locality, he said.
The bureau would also begin researching the feasibility of two other projects, Wen said.
One is to study the possibility of enhancing operation speeds on the railway line connecting Yilan, Hualien and Taitung counties; and the other is to study whether the South Link Line can be upgraded to a dual-track system and whether an express railway service can be launched on the line, he said.
The bureau would retain consulting firms to evaluate the feasibility of the projects, Wen said, adding that the evaluations would cost NT$22 million and NT$27.9 million respectively.
The consulting firms would be asked to deliver reports in 12 months and 18 months respectively, he added.
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications has made building a “national express railway network” its guiding policy for the construction of railway systems, which would allow people to travel around the nation within six hours, the ministry said.
People can travel from Taipei to Kaohsiung in 90 minutes using the high-speed rail system.
As the ministry is planning to extend the high-speed rail line to Yilan and Pingtung counties, the travel time from Taipei to Hualien, as well as from Kaohsiung to Taitung, would each be reduced to 90 minutes with the combined use of the high-speed rail and Taiwan Railways Administration systems, it said.
The travel time from Hualien to Taitung would be reduced to 70 minutes with the introduction of an express railway service, it added.
Minister of Transportation and Communications Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said that transportation would provide the basis for the development of the tourism industry.
Visitors could travel around Taiwan freely if the government made it possible for them to circle the island in six hours in either direction, he said.
The renovation of the railway stations along the South Link Line would not only benefit the residents of Taitung, but also domestic and international tourists, he said.
The renovations would involve the Dawu (大武), Longsi (瀧溪), Jinlun (金崙), Duoliang (多良), Taimali (太麻里), Jhihben (知本) and Kangle (康樂) stations in Taitung County, and the Kanding (崁頂), Nanchou (南州), Jhenan (鎮安), Linbian (林邊), Chiadong (佳冬), Donghai (東海), Chialu (加祿), Neishih (內獅) and Fangshan (枋山) stations in Pingtung County.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,