A Tentative Trip To Taiwan's Taipei

Taipei is the capital and a special municipality of Taiwan. Located in northern Taiwan, Taipei City is an enclave of the municipality of New Taipei City that sits about 16 miles) southwest of the northern port city of Keelung. Most of the city lies on the Taipei Basin, an ancient lakebed. The basin is bounded by the relatively narrow valleys of the Keelung and Xindian rivers, which join to form the Tamsui River along the city's western border.

The city proper is home to an estimated population of 2,646,204, forming the core part of the Taipei–Keelung metropolitan area, which includes the nearby cities of New Taipei and Keelung with a population of 7,047,559, the 40th most-populous urban area in the world - roughly one-third of Taiwanese citizens live in the metro district.

To use a technical term, often inserted in these blogs to challenge and educate our readers, Taipei is "big"!

Taiwan used to be called the Republic of Formosa and today officially calls itself the Republic of China. In 1949 The Republic of China (Taiwan) fell out formally and "finally" with the People's Republic of China (China). The latter would really like its former territory back; but Taiwan is a democracy and China, whilst often claiming it is, isn't!

Confused.com

The city crept into fbb's bloggable consciousness when correspondent James sent this picture of real time information which he had previously received, Chinese whisper style (sort of appropriate!), from one of his chums.

This, in turn, led to a more extensive email from correspondent David, who lives in Taipei from time to time.

fbb is grateful to David for a whole host of information which your tentative Taipei blogger will attempt to enhance; and then, probably, get reprimanded by David for getting it all wrong! fbb has already been chided for saying Taipei is "in China".

David writes:-

But to more important matters - that bus stop display...

The displays change to 'Coming Soon' when the bus is around three minutes away. Prior to that, the display alternates between ...

"XX minutes"

and

"XX stops",

... the latter indicating how many stops away the bus is. That can be especially useful when the traffic is bad since the 'minutes' is based on normal road conditions. The system is remarkably accurate.

Other display entries include ...

"No service" (if there is no service on that route on that day)

and

"Service over" (if the last bus of the day on that route has gone).

It's not desperately obvious from that photo, but that bus stop is in a bus lane, which in Taipei are in the middle of the road, accessible only via light controlled pedestrian crossings. 

It sounds an odd thing to do but the big plus is that buses are never held up by taxis stopping, bicycles, parked cars or delivery vans.

Below is a better picture of a stop on Roosevelt Avenue (a main - and long - thoroughfare) as above; showing how the bus lane system works.

The Taipei bus system (which is set up a little like London with multiple operators under a single umbrella) actually works remarkably effectively, even if the network and route numbering system (which once did have a logic but that has since long vanished) makes London look like a doddle to understand!

The sainted Wikipedia gives more detail, but may not be totally up to date; as we know "it's all in-line".

Before 1976, each bus operator, including ones operated by the Taipei City Bus Administration (now Metropolitan Transport Company), had their own fare structure and tickets. Paper tickets could not be used between different operators, making transfers between routes inconvenient. Bus routes were individually planned by the operators, often creating areas that had either too much or not enough service.

Such are the benefits of the "commercial model".

The system is now jointly operated by 15 individual bus transit agencies, sharing the same fare structure, ticketing process, and route numbering. Although most routes are operated by a single agency, there are some joint routes.

The 15 agencies are:-

The latter was owned by the Taipei city authorities but is now privatised.

Despite the common fares and marketing, this leads to a variety of vehicles and liveries ...

... whilst publicity on-line can also be very colourful ...

 

... sometimes even moving about!

It all looks considerably more interesting than, say, London.

Tomorrow we shall explore maps and timetables; but we must not forget that Taipei has a Metro system as well. There are six lines ...

... which (again according to Wikipedia) each have a posh official name and a colour which eveyone understands and uses - including the metro itself.

Much of the infrastructure is overhead ...

... which must offer some marvellous views of this massive city in action. Other bits are underground, and note the platform edge doors.

The system is justly famous world-wide for its quality, efficiency and safety record.

It is also famous for being very busy (in a self disciplined way) at peak times.

Snippets
Flixbus Fails?
Just a week ago, Flixbus started its onslaught in the UK coach market with three low key routes. Roger French tried out the Portstmouth route where he was one of three passengers, all pre-booked, of course.

But today it appears that the route has been dropped - already!

Although Portsmouth remained in the web site yesterday afternoon ....

... attempts to book were, erm, unsuccessful.

Roger French has twittered that he has heard that the route has been dropped almost before it has started. Doesn't look good for the company's avowed plan to become market leader in the UK?

In an ironic twist of fate, the coach that provided the first Pompey run used to be operated by ...

... guess who ...

... National Express.

The Great Carriage Shed Rebuild.

Lookin' good - well better!

And even better with the applicatiuion of stonework "plating".

 Next Taipei blog : Friday 17th July