One of the major questions that goes around the transit world is, “Which subway is the best?” The Taipei Metro, colloquially known as the jie-yun (捷運) ranks as one of the cleanest, most reliable, and efficient subways in the world. Opening in 1996, the jie-yun was the first subway in Taiwan and provides 1.1 million rides each weekday with its 75 km network. Taipei’s Metro has recently pushed for environmental friendliness by placing recycle bins adjacent to every trash can. Instead of printing millions of paper tickets, Taipei Metro distributes reusable tickets. Passengers either use a yo-yo card (悠遊卡), a rechargeable pre-paid smart card that can be used over and over again, or microchip tokens that are collected at the end of journey, allowing the tokens to be reused. Reliability has not been a major issue with the subway. In 2005, only 29 delays of more than 5 minutes struck the system, allowing Taipei to boast about its service being better than that of New York, Paris, and London.
Read more about cleanliness, organization, and general impressions of the Taipei Metro below.
With 69 stations, Taipei’s subway is still small, when compared to the Paris Métro or the London Tube. Unlike most cities, where numbers or letters are given to designate lines, Taipei names their lines according to their destinations. Some lines are interconnected by a common tunnel. Several other subway investments are on the way in order to relieve the traffic on the surface. Many new lines will open in the near future.
Being a passenger in the Taipei subway is an unique experience. Television screens are placed throughout the platforms displaying news, soap operas, and of course, lots of commercials. The screens also tell when the next trains are coming, switching between English and Chinese every so often. LED screens onboard the trains announce the stops in Chinese and in English, and the audio announcements are in Chinese, Taiwanese, and English. Underground stations are air-conditioned, well maintained, modern, and clean, which is a relief to the hot weather outside. Since rush hour can be extremely crowded, white lines designate where to queue up to board the trains. People are expected to wait for passengers to exit the train first and most do so. One noticeable aspect of the Taipei Metro is that the door close chime first is a chirping noise followed by a siren.
Taipei’s subway, after an analysis of Nova International Railway Benchmarking Group and the Community of Metros (Nova/CoMet), received the highest score of subway reliability. Both groups analyze several subway networks from various cities ranging from Moscow to São Paulo and from Hong Kong to London.