The bullet train from Taipei to Kaohsiung. They say it will be finished and ready to ride in a year. I doubt it. I have spoken with some engineers working on the route, and they say it will be 2005, maybe 2007 and I say 2008, just before the Beijing Olympics.
When do you think it will be ready to ride and will you ride it often or just once as a lark?
It does look cool, the first car is designed very sleek. Nice job. But when will it be ready?
I just edited 16,000-plus words of construction rules as part of the “Challenge 2008” 10 super-duper, big-ticket projects.
One section has a Web site and contact number to report shoddy work or, to the point here, when a project or part of it goes beyond the completion date as posted publicly.
So you can call and complain…but I think it will be on time.
And what time is that projected to be, as of now. MONTH? YEAR? When will first passengers ride it for 90 minute whoosh thru Taiwan?
I thought they were still haggling over how many stations to include. Five was the last count I heard. Hardly a bullet train.
The route will have several different stopping patterns aside from the Taipei - Kaohsiung express. For your reference, I have pasted the proposed THSRC service chart below.
I heard there will be no more national flights. That might open the way to Private pilots and THAT would be cool!
Maybe they cut the number of flights to some of the destinations, but I doubt they will stop them entirely. After all it would be a market decision by the individual airlines. In Germany the ICE didn’t replace national flights either though Lufthansa (the national carrier) said it may stop those …
impossible. The train won’t go EVERYWHERE. What about places like Taitung? Hualien? Never mind Penghu? Kinmen? Matsu? 
No, the major domestic carriers (four of them?) got together for a big summit about a month ago–they discussed link sharing, or possibly merging. No consensus was made though. Taiwan could survive with two local carriers–still competition, but better staff, service, planes.
Looks like our bullet train will be old and out of date by the time we get it.
If we ever get it.
Kind of like Taiwanese military weaponry.
But that’s only 120 miles an hour anyway. Didn’t 125s come into service in the uk about 30 years ago?
Mph, not kph.
[quote=“Josefus”]Looks like our bullet train will be old and out of date by the time we get it.
If we ever get it.
Kind of like Taiwanese military weaponry.[/quote]
exactly… not just outdated and out classed (the ShangHai airport to city Mag-Lev train does well over 400km/h and has been operating for nearly a year now) but irrelevant… A guy I ride bikes with was the chief (foreign) engineer on the project and he told me that in the very first meeting between the Taiwanese planners and the foreign “hired gun” engineering firms, they asked the local planners why they weren’t connecting the high speed rail to any existing transport networks… “you foreigners don’t understand Taiwanese culture”… they have deliberately built it as a stand alone line, not linked it to the Taipei or Gaoxiung metro trains, or even to the airport… in a nod to the binlang stained ranks of taiwan’s social security net, aka the taxi industry, you’ll have no choice but to taxi it to and from the high speed rail… add to that the fact that the stops / stations are not actually in, or in fact anywhere near the city they serve and it’s utterly pointless…
As someone who does business in Taiwan and China and has to get from Taichung to the airport and back at least monthly you’d think I would be a prime target candidate for the high speed train… well this is what it would take for me to use the high speed rail to the airport…
1. take a taxi from Taichung city to Wu-Ri where the “Taichung” station is located, 25km down the #1 highway (the section that is always traffic choked)
cost = NT$400 - NT$500
time = 1 hour
2. take the “high speed” train to TaoYuan county, somewhere near the airport
cost = NT$500 - NT$700 (no final pricing yet)
time = 1hour
3. take a taxi from the TaoYuan high speed rail station to the airport (the section of road that is always choked with cars)
cost = NT$300 - NT$400
time = 15mins to 1hour (depending on traffic)
so to take the “high speed rail” will take on average:
cost : NT$1400
time : 2.5 hours (adding time waiting for the train getting taxis etc.)
OR
I could take the bus like I do now:
cost = NT$250
time = less than 2 hours
so it’ll effectively do nothing to aid access to Taiwan for business travellers or locals, offering a slower, more expensive, harder to use means of accessing Taiwan’s cities, but hey, it only cost a few billion tax payer’s dollars, so what the hell… it’s worth it for greaseball A-Bian to be able to cut the red ribbon and announce that Taiwan is now just the best, most super duper place on earth and anyone who says otherwise is a nasty communist bully
interesting insight.
Just yesterday I was talking to a local about the High Speed Rail, and his response was “you don’t actually think it was supposed to be FUNCTIONAL do you? These projects exist in Taiwan to fund the pockets of the contract firms that get the jobs - take a look around at all the concrete here”
Your source isn’t up to speed. For all of its potential problems, the high speed rail will connect to the Taipei MRT at the future Nangang station (also the high speed rail terminus), Taipei Main Station/Railway Station, the future Banciao station and also to the CKS Airport MRT line extension to Taoyuan City.
In Kaohsiung, the line will eventually extend to Kaohsiung Railway Station, while the current terminus at Tsoying will link to the future Lienchihtan MRT station.
Of course, all this is at least five to six years from now.
zhujianlun is spot on, the HSR is going to link at several points with other public transport.
The only weakness I see is that there is no stop at CKS as the line doesn’t go directly to there, instead you will need to take a shuttle bus or taxi from the stop near Taoyuan city, though it will be linked in future by a new MRT line. Still somewhat inconvenient, though hopeful they are clever enough to have remote check-in terminals when using the new MRT or HSR+MRT.
Here is a nice website about the HSR: thsrc.com.tw/emain/main.asp
[quote]Looks like our bullet train will be old and out of date by the time we get it.
If we ever get it.[/quote]
We will get it and things are not as bad as they seem (or made appear to be).
And in defense, when the project was tendered that new train wasn’t available, so it’s not fair to blame anyone for not having the latest. The new HSR maybe “old” but it still will be a modern and fast train.
Besides, there shouldn’t be too much into the way of buying faster trains in future and run them on the same tracks, the German ICE for example is in it’s 3rd generation and the Japanese Shinkansen also has several generations in service, and I haven’t heard anyone calling the older types ‘out-of-date’ just because they aren’t as fast as the latest models.
When the Airport MRT line opens, the transfer at Taoyuan will not be so problematic. The alternative would have been building three HSR stations at the airport
The Shanghai maglev is a completely different animal. It is an airport express, not an intercity train service. Moreover, the maglev is never going to be profitable - I doubt they even cover operating expenses!
If what you have typed is accurate, then your friend knows absolutely nothing about the project. The MRT, HSR, and TRA will be completely integrated, forming one of the most comprehensive transportation platforms in the world.
Nangang:
Taipei MRT Brown Line & Blue Line
TRA Commuter Line, Keelung-Taipei-Taoyuan
TRA Express
Taipei Main Station:
Taipei MRT Blue Line & Red Line
TRA Commuter Line, Keelung-Taipei-Taoyuan
TRA Express
Banciao:
Taipei MRT Blue Line
Taipei County Circular Line
TRA Commuter Line, Keelung-Taipei-Taoyuan
Taoyuan:
CKS Airport/ Taoyuan MRT
Hsinchu:
Hsinchu LRT
Taichung:
TRA Commuter Line, Fongyuan-Tanzih-Taichung-Wurih
Taichung MRT Green Line
Chiayi:
BRT Line
Tainan:
BRT Line
Kaohsiung:
TRA Commuter Line, Kaohsiung-Pingtung-Chaojhou
Kaohsiung MRT (Kaohsiung Int. Airport)
[quote]
As someone who does business in Taiwan and China and has to get from Taichung to the airport and back at least monthly you’d think I would be a prime target candidate for the high speed train… well this is what it would take for me to use the high speed rail to the airport…
1. take a taxi from Taichung city to Wu-Ri where the “Taichung” station is located, 25km down the #1 highway (the section that is always traffic choked)
cost = NT$400 - NT$500
time = 1 hour[/quote]
Wujih is 7km from the center of Taichung. It can be reach in seven minutes by train or fifteen via taxi.
[quote]2. take the “high speed” train to Taoyuan county, somewhere near the airport
cost = NT$500 - NT$700 (no final pricing yet)
time = 1hour[/quote]
The forty minute trip from Taichung to Taoyuan will be NT$425 (NT$3.459 X 123km).
[quote]3. take a taxi from the Taoyuan high speed rail station to the airport (the section of road that is always choked with cars)
cost = NT$300 - NT$400
time = 15mins to 1hour (depending on traffic)[/quote]
Taoyuan HSR Station, located 6km from the airport, is connected to an access road that links with a new interchange at highway #2. Travel time between the airport and station will be about ten minutes.
[quote]so to take the “high speed rail” will take on average:
cost : NT$1400
time : 2.5 hours (adding time waiting for the train getting taxis etc.)[/quote]
Fare: NT$475
Time: fifty-seven minutes
[quote]so it’ll effectively do nothing to aid access to Taiwan for business travellers or locals, offering a slower, more expensive, harder to use means of accessing Taiwan’s cities, but hey, it only cost a few billion tax payer’s dollars, so what the hell… it’s worth it for greaseball A-Bian to be able to cut the red ribbon and announce that Taiwan is now just the best, most super duper place on earth and anyone who says otherwise is a nasty communist bully
Excellent rebuttal, Chung, and kudos for all of the links.
The other thing that’s helpful when assessing Taiwan’s transport problems is to compare them with those of other major cities stateside. New York, for example, is notorious for poor transport connections to JFK. And even if you make it to the subway, says one airport Web site,
Ah, Taiwan.
Does anyone know where the “locomotive cars” of the HSR will be? I’ve heard that on an exhibition website (in Chinese) the cars that provide the power will be in the middle, instead of up front like classic trains.
Can anyone help me confirm this? I’ve searched around on High speed rail, Shinkasen, mag lev and HSR sites, but I haven’t yet come across anything about the locomotive cars.
My girlfriend is preparing a presentation on leadership, and being able to use a local metaphor like this will help a lot 
[quote=“zhujianlun”]When the Airport MRT line opens, the transfer at Taoyuan will not be so problematic. The alternative would have been building three HSR stations at the airport
