It is free rides until mid 2016. Pilot phase means starting service on just one section. There are 4 sections to go.
The story of the music performance center and the surrounding area is peculiar: the winner of the design contest Kaohsiung city made was a young architect from Madrid and his studio, that also employed the help of a very well-known structural engineering firm from Barcelona. Another of the contenders was a Chinese architect firm who got, as one would put it, butthurt in losing against a young architect fresh from university and with no experience.
So this Chinese firm went on to Spain and basically bought the studio where this architect was employed. And they basically fired everyone but the architect who designed the buildings, and put their own people to work on it. They also decided to break their contract with the engineering firm (and also employ their own people).
Iām sure people will complain about poor execution, and that the Chinese firm will try by all means to get the architect who designed the project fired (even when keeping him was a sine qua non condition for executing the project).[/quote]
Odd indeed. DO you mean a Chinese firm from China or a Chinese firm from Taiwan?
These days āChineseā 99% of the time refers to Chinaā¦
I concur, but was wondering why a āChineseā firm will be bidding for a Taiwanese project? Are they allowed?
I think the idea is that they lost the bid to a Spanish firm and sour grapes and all that, they decided to take the bid anyway through the backdoor approach.
The story of the music performance center and the surrounding area is peculiar: the winner of the design contest Kaohsiung city made was a young architect from Madrid and his studio, that also employed the help of a very well-known structural engineering firm from Barcelona. Another of the contenders was a Chinese architect firm who got, as one would put it, butthurt in losing against a young architect fresh from university and with no experience.
So this Chinese firm went on to Spain and basically bought the studio where this architect was employed. And they basically fired everyone but the architect who designed the buildings, and put their own people to work on it. They also decided to break their contract with the engineering firm (and also employ their own people).
Iām sure people will complain about poor execution, and that the Chinese firm will try by all means to get the architect who designed the project fired (even when keeping him was a sine qua non condition for executing the project).[/quote]
Odd indeed. DO you mean a Chinese firm from China or a Chinese firm from Taiwan?[/quote]
Iām not sure, but I found an article in the online version of the Spanish newspaper ABC that mentions two outfits in the context of the project: Made In, a Spanish architectural team, and Hoy Architects, which the article calls a Taiwanese company (caveat lectorāI donāt know whether the Hoy firm is the firm that Blaquesmith is referring to, and I donāt know Spanish or Chinese):
[quote]Con una duraciĆ³n prevista de cuatro aƱos, la construcciĆ³n del centro comenzarĆ” en breve bajo la direcciĆ³n del equipo espaƱol Made In, que participarĆ” en todo el proceso de ejecuciĆ³n del proyecto en colaboraciĆ³n con la empresa taiwanesa Hoy Architects. Kaohsiung, desde donde salen los barcos cargados de ordenadores y pantallas de plasma que se fabrican en TaiwĆ”n, tendrĆ” a partir de 2015 un emblemĆ”tico centro cultural Ā«made in SpainĀ».[/quote]āPablo M. DĆez, āTaiwan Ā«made in SpainĀ»,ā ABC, January 24, 2011 abc.es/20110123/cultura/abcp ā¦ 10123.html
This looks like Made Inās page: madeinarchitects.tumblr.com/#about
This appears to be the Hoy firmās site: hoy.com.tw/
This might or might not be relevant: kpop.com.tw/html/results_4_e.html
Iāll add this one, just in case: akichiatlas.com/en/archives/kaohsiung_marine.php
It is free rides until mid 2016. Pilot phase means starting service on just one section. There are 4 sections to go.[/quote]
I wonder how ticketing will be done? Honor system like light rail in PDX (Portland, Oregon), or with gates like newer light rail stations in Los Angeles?
I have not seen any indication that gates are being installed. It would only take one person to sweep the train occasionally with a scanner to see who has paid or not.
4 stations that arenāt useful in almost any way (except that they begin at the depot) could open in October. They might be able to finish it all the way to the Love River relatively quickly but they have a lot of work to do on the bridge still and they havenāt even started tearing up Pier 2 yet. It might be mid 2016 before that section of Phase 1 is complete.
I saw a bunch of dudes with wands and walls taken down and a new station!
They donāt seem to have much infrastructure to manage the flow of vehicles, and this stretch of train goes through a fairly sense area anyways. I foresee a traffic mess. I can see the appeal of using exising tracks, but in sone places they should have considered going up or under.
Anyways, only a few more stations left to close the loop!
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The crowds on the LRT have been insane this weekend with the festivals going on. They shouldnāt have any doubt that the system will continue to be used as they continue expanding it. Now they just need to make the trains about three times as big.
Gotta love the headline informing us that Kaohsiung is in Southern Taiwan. Great work as always, Taiwan News.
Iāve tended to snigger when i wait for it and see it go by pretty much empty, usually. So there is room for doubt. That said, once the loop is closed itāll be a great complement to the MRT. At the same time, itāll make rush hour even worse since the city is incapable of managing the lights as it is!
Isnāt everything outside of Taipei pretty much southern Taiwan?
Well if each of the hundreds of people packed onto every train I saw yesterday and today represents another scooter or car not on the roads, that can only be good for traffic.
Letās see what it looks like after the holiday weekend
I certainly hope it improves traffic flow, and having trains that go to other parts of the city can only be a good thing. Iām just skeptical based on what Iāve seen on not the long weekend 
How do I know my red light is about to turn green? The next light turns red. And now there are extra trains thrown into the mix 
Youāre summarizing some of the many reasons why I donāt drive in Taiwan and am therefore always happy to see more public transportation. It was seriously almost too crowded to be usable today, though.
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Riding Kaohsiung light rail is free until February 25. Now you must tap on and tap off at the platforms.
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We rode it recently, was just a tap on, not off. Maybe just a new years thing?
Kaohsiung Light Rail routes have not yet been incorporated into Google Maps. This caused me a bit of confusion todayā¦
Always been that way.
The rules have changed. Right now the rides are free but they still want you to tap on/off. I guess itās for them to collect ridership stats. Come Feb. 26, the fare is based on distance, so you must tap on/off. The ticket machines onboard have been removed, so you must tap at platforms.
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They are technically still ālive testingā the new route section until the end of next month. The route will probably update on Google and Apple Maps at the end of the test period.
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