Shifting Transfers from Taipei Main to Zhongxiao Xinsheng

A couple interesting tidbits related to the opening of Dongmen Station, slated for this coming Sunday (September 30th):
For those who don't know, one of the most cited benefits of separating the Zhonghe Line from the Danshui Line and merging it with the Xinzhuang Line is that it will relieve crowding in Taipei Main Station by making it possible for people traveling between the Zhonghe Line and eastern Taipei to transfer at Zhongxiao Xinsheng.  According to the Taipei MRT Corporation, currently on the average day 257,000 transfers occur at Taipei Main Station, and 77,000 at Zhongxiao Xinsheng.  With the opening of the Zhonghe-Xinzhuang connection, the number of transfers at Taipei Main will decrease by 53,000 to 204,000, and increase at Zhongxiao Xinsheng to 129,000.  Other media reports have suggested a more modest (and less specific) shift of somewhere between 20 and 30,000 transfers, which seems low to me given that transferring at Zhongxiao Xinsheng will be faster for everyone traveling between eastern Taipei and anywhere south of Guting, on both the Xindian and the Zhonghe Lines.  I do wonder however if the numbers take into account the likely increase in ridership that will result from faster trips and increased frequency on the Zhonghe Line, which should lead to a lot of new MRT passengers transferring at Zhongxiao Xinsheng, not just people who used to transfer at Taipei Main.
Another service change which occurred earlier this month is that the headway between trains on the Bannan Line during peak hours decreased from 2 minutes 15 seconds to 2 minutes 5 seconds.  Not huge, but anything that decreases crowding on that line is a good idea, and frankly overdue.  I wonder if they can up frequency any higher.

Taipei MRT's Most and Least Popular Stations

Below are the top ten busiest stations in the Taipei MRT in 2011, according to the number of times each station was entered and exited.

1. Taipei Main Station         Bannan, Danshui           113,478,000

2. Taipei City Hall               Bannan                        43,101,000

3. Ximen                            Bannan, Xiaonanmen    42,980,000

4. Zhongxiao Fuxing            Bannan, Wenhu            37,358,000

5. Xinpu                             Bannan                        29,763,000

6. Zhongxiao Dunhua          Bannan                         26,897,000

7. Danshui                          Danshui                        26,564,000

8. Jiantan                            Danshui                        25,753,000

9. Zhongshan                      Danshui                        22,603,000

10. Banqiao                        Bannan                         21,660,000

The top four stations aren’t particularly surprising, given that they are either major transit hubs (Main Station, City Hall), commercial areas (City Hall, Ximen, Zhongxiao Fuxing) or job centers (Main Station, City Hall).  More surprising is the popularity of Xinpu, located in an area with no destinations that I know of.  Anyone who’s ridden the Bannan Line into Banqiao will have noticed that the train empties out at Xinpu; what’s surprising is that this translates into more boardings and exits than in stations like Danshui or Zhongxiao Dunhua that are next to major destinations.  The only explanation I can think of is that Xinpu is next to Provincial Highway 64, linking it to western Zhonghe and Xinzhuang, making it a logical transfer point for bus riders from those areas headed towards central Taipei.  This suggests that MRT lines in Xinzhuang and western Zhonghe areas should get high ridership, though the Xinzhuang Line so far has been pretty disappointing.

Everything else on this list isn’t too surprising, though I didn’t expect Danshui and especially Jiantan to be less popular.  I would be curious to see how much traffic through these stations, and in fact through all stations in the top 10, consists of bus transfers- as popular as both are as leisure destinations I suspect a large portion of their popularity is from transfers.

Also to be expected is the preponderance of Bannan Line stations, given how many major destinations the Bannan Line passes and that it is the only line to connect with every other line.  Even more crucially, it is the only high-capacity line in Eastern Taipei, and the only line to connect Eastern Taipei with very high-population areas in the west.

The Wenhu Line, with much lower capacity than the other MRT lines, unsurprisingly only has one station in the top ten, the one it shares with the Bannan Line.  The absence of the Zhonghe and Xindian branches of the Danshui Line and the Luzhou Line is unsurprising as well, given that those lines all run half as frequently as the Danshui and Bannan lines.

Below are the least-used stations in the Taipei MRT:

89. Nangang Software Park                 Wenhu                      621,000

88. Xiaobitan                                      Xiaobitan                  1,261,000

87. Wanfang Community                     Wenhu                     1,384,000

86. Dahu Park                                    Wenhu                      1,730,000

85. Xinhai                                          Wenhu                      2,036,000

84. Zhongyi                                        Danshui                    2,104,000

83. Fuxinggang                                    Danshui                    2,327,000

82. Linguang                                       Wenhu                      2,589,000

81. Muzha                                          Wenhu                      2,882,000

80. Wende                                          Wenhu                      3,013,000

Again, none of these are very surprising: most of these stations are on the medium-capacity Wenhu Line, and most of them are located on the most distant parts of the MRT system.  Many of them are close to other, more popular stations (Nangang Software Park, Wanfang Community), or are in areas that are only partially developed (Nangang Software Park, both Danshui Line stations).

New Taipei and World Car Free Day

Although most residents of Taiwan probably didn’t notice, last Saturday was World Car Free Day, intended to demonstrate that life is not only possible without cars, but better.  Many cities celebrate by banning cars from downtown streets or providing public transit discounts.  New Taipei had another idea however: making it easier for people to drive to an MRT station.

Specifically, the New Taipei Department of Transportation announced that one of their new measures to encourage “green transit” will be increasing car parking space near Dingxi MRT station.  For those who don’t know, Dingxi is one of only two rail stations in Yonghe district, which has 230,000 residents and 40,000 people per km2, the highest population density of any district or city in Taiwan, and is therefore singularly ill-suited to cars.  Dingxi is unsurprisingly one of the most heavily trafficked stations in the Taipei MRT, ranking 14^th out of 89 stations in 2011 and averaging over 26,000 riders a day.  As anyone who has passed through Dingxi can attest, the crowds of people using the station walk there or take a bus, and what’s really needed is more sidewalk space to relieve the pedestrian gridlock on Yonghe Road.  Increasing space for driving will only encourage people to drive more and make walking more inconvenient- in other words will undermine the very goals of World Car Free Day- and regardless will only benefit a small fraction of the people who use Dingxi station.

New Taipei’s other new measures for World Car Free Day are less ridiculous and more banal.  Aside from Dingxi, the Department of Transportation chose two other rail stations- Danshui and Jingtong, in Pingxi- to be “green stations”.  Improvements planned include better pedestrian signage at Danshui and more bicycle “space” at Dingxi (no idea if that means lanes or parking space).  Another “improvement” is more plantings at all three stations, certainly a nice touch but of dubious environmental value.