Construction began yesterday of the Taipei Mass Rapid Transit System's Hsinyi line (信義線).
A ground-breaking ceremony, attended by officials of the city government and Taipei City councilors took place at the site of a new station on the rout of the line between Sungchi Road (松智路) intersection and Chuangchin Road (莊敬路).
The new station is scheduled to be completed by the end of September, 2009, according to the city's Department of Rapid Transit Systems (DORTS).
The new station will be named the World Trade Center station. It is close to the World trade Center and the Taipei 101 building.
Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and DORTS' Director Fan Liang-hsiu (范良鏽) both attended the ground-breaking ceremony as well as the general manager of the Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), Richard Chen (陳椿亮) and KMT Legislator Mu Ming-chu (穆閩珠).
According to transportation officials, the MRT station, with a budget of NT$1.6 billion, will be constructed underground with four exits.
The World Trade Center station is among seven stations that will make up the 6.4km long Hsinyi line, said Chang Hui-chen (張慧珍), a public relations official at the department.
"The Hsinyi Line will start from with the existing Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall station," she said. "Aside from the World Trade Center station, other stations [along the Hsinyi line] will include ones near Ta-an Forest Park, Ta-an Road, Anho Road, Dongmen Market with Hsiangshen being the last station."
The Hsinyi line, running along Hsinyi Road, will be the second MRT line designed to run west-east after the Nankang line (南港線).
Although the Executive Yuan approved construction of the line in 1997, it had been delayed due to financial difficulties, Chang said.
The entire budget for the Hsinyi line is estimated at NT$44.5 billion, Chang said.
"In order to accommodate the current on-going construction of the Taipei 101 building, we've decided to push for the construction of the World Trade Center station now to avoid inconvenience to the surrounding traffic due to digging of the area a second time around [after the Taipei 101 building is finished]," she said.
EXPRESSING GRATITUDE: Without its Taiwanese partners which are ‘working around the clock,’ Nvidia could not meet AI demand, CEO Jensen Huang said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and US-based artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Nvidia Corp have partnered with each other on silicon photonics development, Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said. Speaking with reporters after he met with TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) in Taipei on Friday, Huang said his company was working with the world’s largest contract chipmaker on silicon photonics, but admitted it was unlikely for the cooperation to yield results any time soon, and both sides would need several years to achieve concrete outcomes. To have a stake in the silicon photonics supply chain, TSMC and
IDENTITY: Compared with other platforms, TikTok’s algorithm pushes a ‘disproportionately high ratio’ of pro-China content, a study has found Young Taiwanese are increasingly consuming Chinese content on TikTok, which is changing their views on identity and making them less resistant toward China, researchers and politicians were cited as saying by foreign media. Asked to suggest the best survival strategy for a small country facing a powerful neighbor, students at National Chia-Yi Girls’ Senior High School said “Taiwan must do everything to avoid provoking China into attacking it,” the Financial Times wrote on Friday. Young Taiwanese between the ages of 20 and 24 in the past were the group who most strongly espoused a Taiwanese identity, but that is no longer
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake and several aftershocks battered southern Taiwan early this morning, causing houses and roads to collapse and leaving dozens injured and 50 people isolated in their village. A total of 26 people were reported injured and sent to hospitals due to the earthquake as of late this morning, according to the latest Ministry of Health and Welfare figures. In Sising Village (西興) of Chiayi County's Dapu Township (大埔), the location of the quake's epicenter, severe damage was seen and roads entering the village were blocked, isolating about 50 villagers. Another eight people who were originally trapped inside buildings in Tainan
‘ARMED GROUP’: Two defendants used Chinese funds to form the ‘Republic of China Taiwan Military Government,’ posing a threat to national security, prosecutors said A retired lieutenant general has been charged after using funds from China to recruit military personnel for an “armed” group that would assist invading Chinese forces, prosecutors said yesterday. The retired officer, Kao An-kuo (高安國), was among six people indicted for contravening the National Security Act (國家安全法), the High Prosecutors’ Office said in a statement. The group visited China multiple times, separately and together, from 2018 to last year, where they met Chinese military intelligence personnel for instructions and funding “to initiate and develop organizations for China,” prosecutors said. Their actions posed a “serious threat” to “national security and social stability,” the statement