State-owned Taiwan Railway Corp (TRC) reported yesterday that average daily passenger volume increased about 1.4 percent from a year earlier during the period of June to this month, despite raising ticket prices in June.
In a statement, the company said the number of average daily passengers from June 23 to Dec. 19 was 652,000, up about 10,000 riders,
or 1.4 percent, from a year earlier, while daily ticket revenue rose NT$14.11 million (US$448,577), or 28 percent, to NT$64.44 million during the same period.
Photo: Cheng Wei-chi, Taipei Tim
TRC introduced a 26.8 percent fare hike on June 23 for the first time in 30 years in a bid to reduce its operating deficit.
Following the fare hike and passenger volume increase, sales for this year would increase by NT$2.6 billion from a year earlier, with average daily passenger volume predicted to rise 2.9 percent to almost 670,000, the company said.
TRC said it has kept working with the government to promote the regional TPass program, and average daily passenger volume under TPass rose 26.3 percent from a year earlier to 185,000 from Jan. 1 to Dec. 19.
Since its reorganization from the Taiwan Railways Administration, a government agency, into a corporation in January last year, the state-owned company said, it has intensified efforts to boost its brand value and partnered with the tourism industry to provide a wide range of railway tour packages.
In the first 11 months of this year, TRC said its railway tourism operations generated about NT$100 million in revenue, up 15.12 percent from a year earlier, with sales this year expected to pass NT$120 million.
The company said that it has continued to improve safety, as well as its on-time rate and convenience for passengers.
During the January to October period, TRC’s on-time rate reached 94.24 percent. The rating continued to improve, hitting 97.5 percent last month, a target set by the company.
From January to last month, there were two major accidents, down from four a year earlier, while general accidents fell by three to 38 with the number of driving irregularities down by 88 to 759, it said.
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