Keelung Mayor Xie Guoliang went to the Railway Bureau of the Ministry of Communications to study the follow-up promotion of the Keelung MRT. There is no consensus on financial sharing.

(Photographed by reporter Lu Xianxiu)

[Reporter Lu Xianxiu/Report from Keelung] Keelung Mayor Xie Guoliang has repeatedly challenged the central government due to the sharp increase in Keelung MRT funding. Today, Mayor Xie Guoliang led the deputy mayor and heads of relevant bureaus to the Railway Bureau of the Ministry of Communications to participate in the "Keelung MRT Planning Progress and Follow-up Promotional meeting", the Railway Bureau of the Ministry of Communications stated that the public hearing is expected to be held from the end of April to the beginning of May, and the city government will fully cooperate with the public hearing and the environmental impact assessment review.

Today's meeting was chaired by Wu Shengyuan, director of the Railway Bureau of the Ministry of Communications. Xie Guoliang said that the Keelung MRT involves the sharing of funds and follow-up operations in the three cities of New Taipei City, Taipei City, and Keelung City. It is recommended that the Railway Bureau of the Ministry of Communications should be invited to hold relevant promotion meetings in the future 3 It is more beneficial for the city government to participate together.

As for the three counties and cities meeting at the same time, he said that the topic of discussion today is the Keelung issue, and individual local governments will deal with it individually.

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Xie Guoliang said that the part of the land development benefit of 4.235 billion yuan recently proposed by the Ministry of Communications, after inspection, the development benefit composition is divided into two parts, one is the MRT development zone of 2.110 billion yuan; the other is the potential development zone, which the city government plans around the MRT station The benefit of setting up a specific special area is about 2.125 billion yuan. However, the specific special area has difficulties in obtaining land. Therefore, it is listed as a potential development area, and there are still development uncertainties. It should not be included in land development unless the realizable benefits have been determined. benefit assessment.

In addition, most of the MRT development zones are at the stage of MRT station completion and opening to traffic, and developers enter the site to invest and develop. Therefore, the realization of relevant development benefits is mostly in the later stage of the MRT construction project; According to experience, the rezoning of the land in the development zone takes 5 to 6 years, and even more than 10 years to complete the development. The city government will only have development benefits, which cannot relieve the financial pressure that the city government needs to jointly bear the MRT funds in the short term .

Therefore, the Executive Yuan and the Ministry of Communications are still requested to consider the financial difficulties of the Keelung City Government and extend the funding period, so as to practically help solve the problem of the city government’s funding burden; however, during the meeting, the Railway Bureau of the Ministry of Communications still asked Keelung City to bear 5.4 billion, including land use. The cost is 1.8 billion yuan, and it does not include the appreciation of land costs in recent years and the increase in construction prices during subsequent construction. The two parties still need to continue to communicate and coordinate, and will continue to work hard.

Xie Guoliang also mentioned that local public opinion representatives have repeatedly responded to the request for information related to the Keelung MRT to be open and transparent, and to accelerate the promotion of the Keelung MRT plan.

Hu Xianglin, deputy minister of the Ministry of Communications, said in an interview that the 5.3 billion yuan fund of the Keelung City Government was originally to be shared within a 9-year construction period.

Keelung Mayor Xie Guoliang went to the Railway Bureau of the Ministry of Communications to study the follow-up promotion of the Keelung MRT. There is no consensus on financial sharing.

(Photographed by reporter Lu Xianxiu)