Taipei Times
Date: Dec 09, 2019
By: Shelley Shan / Staff reporter
The Freeway Bureau has finished a feasibility study for extending the freeway overpass connecting New Taipei City’s Wugu District (五股) and Taoyuan’s Yangmei District (楊梅) to Miaoli County.
The feasibility study for constructing an overpass from Yangmei to Miaoli took three years to complete, the agency said yesterday, adding that the Ministry of Transportation and Communications would choose the route that would be used to construct the extension.
The report is being reviewed by the ministry, which would hear opinions from agencies to sort out remaining issues, including where the freeway and the overpass could be connected, if the freeway section in Hsinchu County’s Hukou Township (湖口) should be straightened and how the construction would bypass a geologically fragile zone.
The extension of the overpass, which is alongside the National Sun Yat-sen Freeway (National Freeway No. 1), was proposed by local councilors in 2015 to ease traffic congestion that frequently occurs between Yangmei and Hsinchu during rush hour, as well as on long weekends and major national holidays, the agency said, adding that congestion is caused by those driving past the freeway section in Hsinchu. [FULL STORY]
