Cluttering public stairway landings with shoe cabinets, bicycles or other objects is a serious building code violation with a maximum fine of NT$200,000, the New Taipei City Government’s Public Works Department said.
Citing the Condominium Administration Act (公寓大廈管理條例), Public Works Department section head Chen Te-ju (陳德儒) said the regulations require that the common area of an apartment or condominium be free of any obstruction.
The law stipulates that residents of an apartment building “may not store miscellaneous objects... that obstruct passage in private passages, firebreaks, fire escape alleys, open space for the public, empty recesses, stair landings, common hallways or air raid shelters.”
Chen said that from January to September, the Public Works Department issued 664 warnings to citizens who had violated the building code by obstructing spaces designated as escape routes with objects and furniture.
Only 18 out of the 664 code violations — or 2.7 percent of offenders — were subsequently fined because they were repeat offenders who disregarded warnings, with the fines totaling NT$720,000, or NT$40,000 on average, he said.
However, New Taipei City apartment and condominium dwellers were divided in their opinion of the Condominium Administration Act.
The regulations are “government intrusion into my private space,” a resident of the city’s Shulin District (樹林), surnamed Chen (陳), said, adding that she only put her shoe cabinet on a landing because it did not fit her apartment and that it was not obstructing the stairway.
Although the woman’s sentiment was echoed by many New Taipei City residents, others said the use of common areas must be dictated by the needs of public safety and the greater good, with one New Taipei City resident, who declined to be named, saying that leaving things on stairway landings is “a bad habit” that needs to be “eradicated” by “strict enforcement.”
In response, Chen Te-ju said the language of the Condominium Administration Act leaves no ambiguities.
“Residents have complained that the requirements are too strict and the New Taipei City Government sent an official request for clarification to [the Ministry of the Interior’s] Construction Planning Agency, and it gave us the same answer that I gave you,” he said.
When asked about the low number of citations in comparison to warnings, he said: “Issuing fines is a means to an end. We want citizens to self-regulate for public safety and warnings are designed to give the public an opportunity to improve within a specified time frame.”
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