Taiwan Railway Corp (TRC) yesterday said that it would add more train services on several routes starting on June 26, following the completion of key infrastructure upgrades.
On the Eastern Trunk Line, two additional Tze-Chiang Express trains would begin operating following the reconstruction of Siaocingshui Bridge (小清水溪橋) between Heren (和仁) and Chongde (崇德) stations in Hualien County, the company said.
The bridge was rebuilt after one of the two tracks was destroyed by Typhoon Gaemi in August last year. With dual-track operations resumed in December last year, travel times between Taipei and Hualien have been significantly reduced, it said.
Photo: CNA
The new service beginning June 26 would run between Shulin Station in New Taipei City and Taitung Station, making stops only in Taipei and Hualien, it added.
Two new Tze-Chiang Express (3000) services would also be added to the schedule on the Western Trunk Line on Saturdays between Cidu (七堵) in Keelung and Changhua County, it said.
That would mean additional passenger capacity on the direct services between Taipei, Taichung’s Fongyuan District (豐原), and Taichung, it added.
The company would also add two carriages to each of the 22 local trains running between Keelung and Hsinchu, increasing them to 10-car formations.
A new local morning service would also be launched between Jhongli (中壢) in Taoyuan and Cidu, aimed at alleviating commuter congestion, it said.
With these adjustments, local train capacity in northern Taiwan is expected to rise by 4.4 percent overall and by 10.3 percent during the morning rush hour, the company said.
The company also plans to increase capacity on 18 local train services in central Taiwan following the completion of a project to extend station platforms to accommodate 10-car trains, up from the current eight-car configuration.
In addition, the routes of two Semi Express services between Cidu and Changhua would be extended to Sinzuoying (新左營) in Kaohsiung on weekends and public holidays, increasing overall local train capacity by 5.8 percent, it said.
In total, 386 train services would operate under the revised schedule, it added.
Group ticket reservations for the new services would open on May 23, with general ticket sales beginning on May 29, it added.
Separately, state-run Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) announced on Sunday that about 26,000 high-voltage electricity users would be subject to higher summer rates from May 16 through mid-October.
Summer electricity rates, introduced in 1989 to encourage electricity conservation during peak demand months, typically apply from June to September.
However, the Ministry of Economic Affairs extended the surcharge period for high and extra high-voltage consumers, such as science parks, department stores and hotels, in 2023, citing the growing challenges of climate change.
While these users represent less than 1 percent of electricity customers in Taiwan, they consume more than 60 percent of the electricity, Taipower said.
Meanwhile, the nation’s 14 million residential and small business users would continue to pay summer rates over the standard period, from June 1 to Sept. 30, it added.
Costa Rica sent a group of intelligence officials to Taiwan for a short-term training program, the first time the Central American country has done so since the countries ended official diplomatic relations in 2007, a Costa Rican media outlet reported last week. Five officials from the Costa Rican Directorate of Intelligence and Security last month spent 23 days in Taipei undergoing a series of training sessions focused on national security, La Nacion reported on Friday, quoting unnamed sources. The Costa Rican government has not confirmed the report. The Chinese embassy in Costa Rica protested the news, saying in a statement issued the same
Taiwan’s Liu Ming-i, right, who also goes by the name Ray Liu, poses with a Chinese Taipei flag after winning the gold medal in the men’s physique 170cm competition at the International Fitness and Bodybuilding Federation Asian Championship in Ajman, United Arab Emirates, yesterday.
A year-long renovation of Taipei’s Bangka Park (艋舺公園) began yesterday, as city workers fenced off the site and cleared out belongings left by homeless residents who had been living there. Despite protests from displaced residents, a city official defended the government’s relocation efforts, saying transitional housing has been offered. The renovation of the park in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), near Longshan Temple (龍山寺), began at 9am yesterday, as about 20 homeless people packed their belongings and left after being asked to move by city personnel. Among them was a 90-year-old woman surnamed Wang (王), who last week said that she had no plans
TO BE APPEALED: The environment ministry said coal reduction goals had to be reached within two months, which was against the principle of legitimate expectation The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday ruled in favor of the Taichung Environmental Protection Bureau in its administrative litigation against the Ministry of Environment for the rescission of a NT$18 million fine (US$609,570) imposed by the bureau on the Taichung Power Plant in 2019 for alleged excess coal power generation. The bureau in November 2019 revised what it said was a “slip of the pen” in the text of the operating permit granted to the plant — which is run by Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) — in October 2017. The permit originally read: “reduce coal use by 40 percent from Jan.