No offense llary, but what are you talking about? Other than the weather, Taipei has far better air quality than Taichung and far better traffic. We also have the MRT remember, which is a clean, cheap sane way to travel and makes living in the suburbs (where the air is even better) a breeze.
And one connection non-Taipei people fail to make is that the rainy weather is part of the reason we have better air. There’s nothing like the evening after the afternoon monsoon has washed everything out of the sky and it’s clear skies and fresh air for the rest of the day. You go for a bike ride and can see stars.
As for parks, Taipei has 200km of bike paths along the rivers, much of it nicely landscaped and improving yearly. We have more park space per person than anywhere else in Taiwan. We have a national park to the north and the mountains of Maokong to the south (accessible by a cheap gondola once it gets back going) and places like Elephant Mountain right in the city. And as jimi and others have discovered, it’s hard to get out of taichung to anywhere fresh and green and uncrowded in a short time.
I wonder if you are remembering a Taiwan of ten years ago. Yes, Taichung used to be the better city but it hasn’t been for years and has been eclipsed by all the other major cities. Crime is certainly the worst. Kaohsiung, you have nothing nice to say about Kaohsiung? It’s becoming one of the most liveable cities in taiwan. Give it another ten years to get air pollution down (already 50% less than 5 years ago) and it will be probably the best city to live. Great weather, wide streets with sidewalks, a good MRT that even goes out to the beach (yes, the city has a beach), a great harbour, good hiking, bike paths, the lovely Love River running through the centre, etc, etc.
As for the east, Ilan, Luodong, Jiaoshi are less than an hour to Taipei via the tunnel. Even Hualien is only 4.5 hours from taipei now.
Time to get out there and re-explore the land, llary.
Actually, I live here in Pingtung county, and I’m dreading going back to Taichung next year to finish my MA.
The weather is awesome and the people are friendly. As long as you don’t mind living in the countryside, (I’m about 40 minutes by motorcycle away from KKH), the south and east are the best.
Taichung did look good on specs, but now I’ve been here a few weeks it seems a bit of a disappointment.
As for air quality I know Taibei seemed pretty bad when I arrived from Australia. I’m looking forward to revisiting it after living in Taichung for a while. Is there any data on air pollution to compare?
I’ve been living in Taichung for a year now and I definitely think it was a mistake. As Mucha Man pointed out, we tend to expect smaller cities like Taichung to be better than large cities like Taipei, but in Taiwan this simply isn’t the case.
Pingdong, Tainan, Hualien and Taitung all seem like much better choices.
The main things to remember about Taipei air pollution is it is 98% vehicle exhaust according to the EPA. Get away from traffic and you are fine unless there is an inversion such as before a heavy rainfall. Then the air can be still and foul for the whole day. Ozone is a problem on hot days during the late morning and afternoon but then it is too hot to be outside anyways.
On average statistics show the air quality downtown is comparable to London or New York. Much better in the suburbs. I hike in the hills in the south and there are lots of days I can see clear across town to the ocean.
MM, I know you live on the south side of the Taipei basin, but have you ever lived on the north side? Why did you pick the south side over the north side?
Happenstance. My wife was from Muzha. We met when we were both in Taoyuan and on visits back to her family I noticed it was a hell of a lot greener. My wife of course was happy to move closer to her family. Over the years this neighborhood has gotten better and better, so there is no reason to leave.
I like the north part of the city too. We do have quicker access to the mountains here though unless you live right on Yangmingshan. Also the trails are natural and a lot less busy. But Tienmu, Guandu, Bali and so on are all good places to live. I love that I can go for long walks and bike rides here in Muzha at night completely off road and hear owls and crickets and breathe fresh air. And we have all the tea houses and restaurants in the hills. Nothing like sitting on a patio at 6pm overlooking a lush valley that drops into the city teeming with traffic and noise and knowing how lucky you are.
But I must get going. I’ve got to drive to Tatajia. I am finally going to climb Yushan tomorrow.
I’m sorry dude, but you’re way off on this one. Taichung air is mildly offensive; Taipei air is fucking disgusting. I know you live in Mucha blah blah but pick any city in the world and there will be somewhere out of the way with vaguely clean air. I used to live in Da Keng - part of Taichung City - and the air was as clean as it gets. I would bet cash money that the air is cleaner than Mucha in fact, but that’s because no sod lives there. My wife did not want to live up a mountain any more so I made a compromise for her and moved into the city. After a few hours in Taipei City I am guaranteed to start coughing up black shit, so if I must live in a city it ain’t gonna be Taipei.
Better traffic is subjective, but I happen to enjoy driving/motorcycling and driving in Taipei is a fucking nightmare. The roads are insanely congested, there is never any parking and half the city is under construction which means you are competing with half a million other cars and scooters for arterial roads that have been turned into half-lane alleys. It takes me longer to drive from Taipei City to the wife’s family in Linkou than it does to do the same drive from Taichung. The only people who say that Taipei traffic is better than Taichung don’t drive.
That’s a romantic way of talking about a city where it pisses down every other day.
Whatever dude.
Taipei:
Taichung (first pic is from my old house, second pic is 10 minutes from my new house in Taiping):
Pingdong:
I can get to Osaka in 3 hours from Taipei and I know which I’d prefer.
I ain’t here to defend Taichung. I AM here to bash Taipei. Maybe it’s time to stop rating world cities by how many bike paths they have. :blah:
Weird, weird, weird! I spend a lot of time in Taichung and I KNOW which place I prefer, hands down, for both driving and clean air. It sure as hell 'aint Taichung, home of some of the craziest driving and most non-existent parking in the country!
I like the way you select pics of the Hehuan expressway at rush hour for Taipei and some mountain retreat for Taichung, though.
The ‘mountain retreat’ was my old house - brand new, 110 pings, $15k/month and all the mosquitoes you could eat - shove that up your Mucha Man and smoke it.
I think it is time for us to stop this inter-city rivalry, join hands and say that every city in Taiwan is a shithole of varying degrees. With that in mind we can all go forth, travel the island and live wherever we damn please.
Sanchong does actually remind me of much of Taizhong (sp?). same shitty traffic, same shitty stinky tofu stands, same shitty grime covered concrete rundown tenement blocks. compare apples with apples and there’s not really that much difference.
plenty of places similar to llary’s mountain top retreat equally far away from Taipei. Taipei does, however, have to suffer some of the most vile periods of grey weather on the planet, with the possible exceptions of Gdansk and London, for three months every winter.
dose look like llary had a busy June swanning about the ROC, though. nice holiday.
I think Taizhong beats Taipei in terms of open spaces and weather, and the dining out is great. But, Taipei is one of the best places in the world for hikers, I think, with the relatively undeveloped mountains all around, with their green filters to purify the air. I’d have to say though that for non-economic / cultural factors, Hualien is the best. It’s a really quaint, beautiful small city. Actually, with the new Taroko Train (which is just called that - doesn’t go there) Hualien is now only 2 hours and 5 minutes away from Taipei. But you’d need to take advantage of this quite often to get some good vittles and international culture.
Taipei is actually not too bad, I think, but for the cost of living. That’s a big one though. There’s a lot going on in Taipei. The MRT is a major plus too. Taizhong really lags in this respect.
I’ve only been to Gaoxiong once, and only for a few hours, but I was very impressed with the place. If I really had to choose a big city to live in, that would be it, although it’s only based upon a very brief glimpse of the place.
In the future, I will probably live somewhere in Ilan, Taidong or Pingdong Counties. I’d be quite happy to live in the countryside, preferably close enough to the beach to surf whenever I wanted. The laid back attitude on the east coast is quite attractive. I sure won’t be living anywhere in Taoyuan County. Aside from being cheaper than Taipei, I can’t see that Taoyuan City has a lot going for it, and pretty well everything else I’ve seen in Taoyuan County is simply backward, without the charm of places like Taidong or Pingdong. I try to spend as much of my time not in Taoyuan City as I can.
Exactly. Like Japan, Switzerland, America, Canada… discussing who lives in the nicest, cleanest, most well-developed and wholesome part of Taiwan is like discussing whose turds are most well-polished.
