Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) yesterday said making the YouBike public bicycle rental service free for the first 30 minutes again has always been his plan.
Chinese-language media earlier in the day reported that the Taipei City Government is planning to reinstate the policy from the beginning of next year.
The policy was implemented when the service was launched in 2012, but it was terminated by then-Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) in 2015. Since then, the first 30 minutes have cost NT$5, with rates rising by NT$10 to NT$40 for 30 minutes after that.
In response to the reports, the Taipei Department of Transportation said that the city government is planning to reinstate the policy, adding that it has not yet decided when it would be implemented.
The department said that it would take into account how many people buy the planned monthly public transportation pass covering Taipei, New Taipei City, Taoyuan and Keelung.
Reinstating the free 30 minutes would incentivize more people to sign up for the YouBike system and reduce carbon emissions from passenger vehicles by 7,000 tonnes per year, the department said.
Taipei has 1,260 YouBike rental stations and the number of rides exceeded 34 million last year, a historic high, it said.
The department said it is working with the Department of Information Technology’s big data center to improve the distribution of bicycles, the location of new stations and increase the number of bicycles at stations with high demand.
“Making the YouBike public bicycle rental service free for the first 30 minutes has always been my policy goal,” Chiang said.
The mayor said he has asked the departments involved to draft comprehensive plans.
Chiang said that the city government would take user complaints into account, for example that some stations usually do not have bicycles at peak times while others have no free slots to return them.
A study published by online booking platform Expedia revealed searches for travel to Taipei have ballooned 2,786 percent following the lifting of COVID-19 pandemic travel restrictions due to the city being a “designation dupe” for Seoul. The TikTok trend for duping — referring to substituting a designation for a more inexpensive alternative — helped propel interest in Taipei, it said in a consumer survey titled “Unpack ‘24,” which was conducted from September to October in 14 countries. Location dupes are “every bit as delightful as the tried-and-true places travelers love,” Expedia trend tracker Melanie Fish said of the year’s popular alternatives, which
A small-scale protest that called on the government to cancel its plan to welcome Indian migrant workers in a bid to tackle Taiwan’s labor shortage was held in Taipei yesterday. During the protest, comprised of a few dozen people staged in front of the Presidential Office on Ketagalan Boulevard, the protest’s chief initiator, a woman identified only as “Yuna” said they wanted the central government to reconsider allowing migrant workers from India to enter Taiwan. Most people in Taiwan had little knowledge about the potential plan to allow in Indian migrant workers until a report in the media last month, she
NO RELIGIOUS VISIT: The interior minister said visas were not issued for 218 applicants for a tour of Taiwan organized by a temple due to their own non-response Chinese who had sought to enter Taiwan for a religious event were not granted visas because they were not “religious personnel” and planned to visit places not listed on their group tour’s itinerary, then never supplied supplemental information upon request, the Ministry of the Interior and the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday. Visas were not issued for 218 of the 239 applicants, as they did not provide additional information or explanations as requested, Minister of the Interior Lin Yu-chang (林右昌) told a committee at the legislature in Taipei. Multiple groups, including the Taiwan Matsu Fellowship, had signed a petition that sought
A military procurement announcement released on Friday shows the purchase of “air/surface” weapons bound for Taitung, likely for the newly purchased Block 70 F-16V jets still awaiting delivery. The announcement shows a NT$17.22 billion (US$548.91 million) purchase agreement signed on Nov. 13 for “aircraft air/surface weapons,” to be delivered to the air force's Seventh Tactical Flight Wing stationed at the Taitung Air Force Base. The sale is scheduled to take place over nine years, with delivery completed by Nov. 30, 2032. Considering the recipient, analysts believe they are likely air-to-air or air-to-surface missiles for the military’s 66 upgraded Block 70 F-16V jets awaiting
RSS