The Fanfan wild hot spring (梵梵溫泉) in Yilan County is to be diverted to formal tourist facilities and closed to the public if approved by the local council, as overtourism is harming the area’s ecology and disturbing residents.
The Yilan County Government proposed a plan to divert the spring to dedicated tourist facilities, similar to the Cingshuei Geothermal Park (清水地熱公園).
If approved by the village council, it would also mean the closure of the wild hot spring to the public.
Photo: Taipei Times
The Fanfan hot spring has become popular in recent years, with many visitors driving their vehicles directly onto the riverbank, barbecuing and leaving trash behind.
The situation has raised the ire of local residents, who have closed off the access road to try and stop people from coming to no avail.
The area is also prone to flash flooding, posing a danger to visitors.
The Yilan County Government in 2020 proposed diverting the hot spring to public land in Yingshi Village (英士) and creating facilities similar to the Cingshuei park, but progress stalled due to disagreements with local stakeholders.
Yilan County Councilor Shen Chih-hung (沈志宏) convened a meeting last week between the country government and village representatives, where the two sides reached a preliminary agreement.
In the short term, the county is to improve crowd management at the hot springs and work to clean up the area, the county government said.
In the longer term, it would open talks with the village council on how to build hot spring facilities while respecting their rights and traditions, it added.
After a consensus is achieved among village residents, the county said it would draw up a formal plan and apply for funding with the central government.
The initial idea is to create a facility like the Cingshuei park, which has a bathhouse, footbath and area to cook corn and eggs in the hot spring water, it said.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
RSS