The Kuanghua Digital New Plaza will officially open to the public on Saturday, two years after its predecessor, the landmark Kuanghua Market, was demolished.
The plaza, located at the intersection of Civic Boulevard and Xinsheng N Road, has been built to accommodate about 270 Kuanghua Market retailers.
Wang San-chung (王三中), a division chief at Taipei City’s Market Administration Office, told a press conference yesterday that the new six-floor building will be the biggest electronic store in the city and feature everything from computers and other consumer electronics to communications products.
LUCKY DRAWS
Wang said retailers will offer up to 50 percent discounts on various products and lucky draw chances every weekend until Aug. 16.
The plaza, which cost the city government NT$700 million, was erected after former Taipei mayor Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration decided to tear down the Kuanghua overpass due to safety concerns in 2006.
Vendors in the 32-year-old, two-story market under the expressway at the corner of Xinsheng N Road and Bade Road were moved to nearby Jinshan N Road while the new building was being built.
HISTORY
Kuanghua Market was opened in 1974 to accommodate about 70 second-hand book sellers spread out along Guling Sreet, although the complex later attracted jade and antique retailers. In its last years, computer and electronics vendors dominated the market.
In response to some vendors’ worries that the new venue would not attract as much business as the old market, Wang said the plaza offered a more comfortable and safer shopping environment.
RENT CONCERNS
Samsung Electronics Taiwan Co, which became the first company to open its store in the Kuanghua Digital New Plaza yesterday, said the rent for its 20-ping store is almost NT$15 million (US$493.6 million) a year, which is about what it pays for its store in the Neo 19 building in Xinyi District.
“Unlike our store in the Neo 19 building, however, this store is giving us a lot of pressure because retailers on the first floor are only allowed to display our new products and models, and are barred from doing business,” said a Samsung official who wished to remain anonymous.
If adding fees such as maintenance, personnel and advertising, the new store will cost the company nearly NT$30 million a year, while generating no direct income, the official said.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY JERRY LIN
Taipei and New Taipei City government officials are aiming to have the first phase of the Wanhua-Jungho-Shulin Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) line completed and opened by 2027, following the arrival of the first train set yesterday. The 22km-long Light Green Line would connect four densely populated districts in Taipei and New Taipei City: Wanhua (萬華), Jhonghe (中和), Tucheng (土城) and Shulin (樹林). The first phase of the project would connect Wanhua and Jhonghe districts, with Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall and Chukuang (莒光) being the terminal stations. The two municipalities jointly hosted a ceremony for the first train to be used
MILITARY AID: Taiwan has received a first batch of US long-range tactical missiles ahead of schedule, with a second shipment expected to be delivered by 2026 The US’ early delivery of long-range tactical ballistic missiles to Taiwan last month carries political and strategic significance, a military source said yesterday. According to the Ministry of National Defense’s budget report, the batch of military hardware from the US, including 11 sets of M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) and 64 MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile Systems, had been scheduled to be delivered to Taiwan between the end of this year and the beginning of next year. However, the first batch arrived last month, earlier than scheduled, with the second batch —18 sets of HIMARS, 20 MGM-140 missiles and 864 M30
Representative to the US Alexander Yui delivered a letter from the government to US president-elect Donald Trump during a meeting with a former Trump administration official, CNN reported yesterday. Yui on Thursday met with former US national security adviser Robert O’Brien over a private lunch in Salt Lake City, Utah, with US Representative Chris Stewart, the Web site of the US cable news channel reported, citing three sources familiar with the matter. “During that lunch the letter was passed along, and then shared with Trump, two of the sources said,” CNN said. O’Brien declined to comment on the lunch, as did the Taipei
A woman who allegedly attacked a high-school student with a utility knife, injuring his face, on a Taipei metro train late on Friday has been transferred to prosecutors, police said yesterday. The incident occurred near MRT Xinpu Station at about 10:17pm on a Bannan Line train headed toward Dingpu, New Taipei City police said. Before police arrived at the station to arrest the suspect, a woman surnamed Wang (王) who is in her early 40s, she had already been subdued by four male passengers, one of whom was an off-duty Taipei police officer, police said. The student, 17, who sustained a cut about
RSS