More than 2 million cars packed the freeways yesterday as the Lunar New Year holiday comes to an end, with heavy congestion reported on only a few sections, the National Freeway Bureau said.
Traffic Management Division section chief Chen Ting-tsai (陳廷才) said total traffic volume on Friday was 2.7 million vehicles, about 1.7 times the average daily traffic volume of about 1.6 million.
“We estimate the total traffic volume [yesterday] was between 2.1 million and 2.3 million vehicles,” Chen said. “Northbound traffic volume was much higher than southbound and peak hours were between 3pm and 6pm.”
Photo: Taipei Times
The bureau said traffic volume between 12am and 7am yesterday was 360,000 vehicles, or 2.4 times the average volume of 150,000 vehicles on weekends, showing that many people took advantage of the toll-free hours to hit the road.
Traffic conditions on the highways were fairly normal before noon and northbound sections that saw congestion in the afternoon were from Siluo (西螺) to Yuanlin (員林) and from the Hsinchu interchange (新竹系統) to Jhubei (竹北) on Freeway No. 1; from Caotun (草屯) to Wufong (霧峰) on Freeway No. 3; from Toucheng (頭城) to Pinglin (坪林) on Freeway No. 5 and the whole Hsuehshan Tunnel (雪山隧道), Chen said.
The bureau reminded drivers to consult the bureau’s online traffic control information and plan ahead before setting out to avoid congestion.
CHANGE OF MIND: The Chinese crew at first showed a willingness to cooperate, but later regretted that when the ship arrived at the port and refused to enter Togolese Republic-registered Chinese freighter Hong Tai (宏泰號) and its crew have been detained on suspicion of deliberately damaging a submarine cable connecting Taiwan proper and Penghu County, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement yesterday. The case would be subject to a “national security-level investigation” by the Tainan District Prosecutors’ Office, it added. The administration said that it had been monitoring the ship since 7:10pm on Saturday when it appeared to be loitering in waters about 6 nautical miles (11km) northwest of Tainan’s Chiang Chun Fishing Port, adding that the ship’s location was about 0.5 nautical miles north of the No.
A Chinese freighter that allegedly snapped an undersea cable linking Taiwan proper to Penghu County is suspected of being owned by a Chinese state-run company and had docked at the ports of Kaohsiung and Keelung for three months using different names. On Tuesday last week, the Togo-flagged freighter Hong Tai 58 (宏泰58號) and its Chinese crew were detained after the Taipei-Penghu No. 3 submarine cable was severed. When the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) first attempted to detain the ship on grounds of possible sabotage, its crew said the ship’s name was Hong Tai 168, although the Automatic Identification System (AIS)
An Akizuki-class destroyer last month made the first-ever solo transit of a Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ship through the Taiwan Strait, Japanese government officials with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. The JS Akizuki carried out a north-to-south transit through the Taiwan Strait on Feb. 5 as it sailed to the South China Sea to participate in a joint exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces that day. The Japanese destroyer JS Sazanami in September last year made the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force’s first-ever transit through the Taiwan Strait, but it was joined by vessels from New Zealand and Australia,
COORDINATION, ASSURANCE: Separately, representatives reintroduced a bill that asks the state department to review guidelines on how the US engages with Taiwan US senators on Tuesday introduced the Taiwan travel and tourism coordination act, which they said would bolster bilateral travel and cooperation. The bill, proposed by US senators Marsha Blackburn and Brian Schatz, seeks to establish “robust security screenings for those traveling to the US from Asia, open new markets for American industry, and strengthen the economic partnership between the US and Taiwan,” they said in a statement. “Travel and tourism play a crucial role in a nation’s economic security,” but Taiwan faces “pressure and coercion from the Chinese Communist Party [CCP]” in this sector, the statement said. As Taiwan is a “vital trading
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