High speed rail service on track, MOTC says

This article was published by the Taiwan Headlines on May 4, 2006. It reports that according to the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, Taiwan's first high speed railway will launch services between Kaohsiung City in southern Taiwan and Banchiao City in northern Taiwan's Taipei County by the end of October 2006.

According to the ministry's officials, if the trains of the Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp. can attain a speed of 340 kilometers per hour and fill 60,000 passenger seats in the first six months, the company will have fulfilled its contract requirements. This is equal to 66 one-way trains every day.

The high speed railway project is now 95 percent complete, with the remaining 5 percent currently undergoing test runs. The Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp. is scheduled to run the high-speed trains between Taichung City in central Taiwan and Banchiao at 300 kilometers per hour by the end of May 2006. By the end of June 2006, the test run speed for the entire 345-kilometer route between Kaohsiung and Banchiao will also be 300 kilometers per hour.

When completed, the high speed trains are expected to carry passengers from one end of Taiwan to the other end in 90 minutes.