Parents Worry About Lantern Festival Crowds Affecting School 台灣燈會湧人潮 鄰近國小家長憂影響上課

This year's lantern festival is open to the public free of charge from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. daily until Feb. 19. The festival's main attraction this year, an exhibition titled Brilliant Light of the Jade Hare, features a 22m-tall "robot" displayed at Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall. However, the traffic, noise and crowds can be quite disturbing for Guangfu Elementary School which is right beside the festival site.

Students of Taipei Municipal Guangfu Elementary School arrived at school early. Some are accompanied by their parents. However, parents are concerned that the noise and packs of visitors from the Taipei Lantern Festival nearby would affect their children during school time.

Parent: “We received a notice from the school a few days ago reminding parents to be careful when driving by the school because of the lantern festival.”

Parent: “The school is constantly reminding us parents to be quick when driving by to drop off and pick up our children.”

The school said the police have surveyed the area before the lantern festival took place and asked if the school could make certain flexible adjustments. The parent association also offered great assistance to ensure the safety of students.

Lai Chun-hsien, Principal, Taipei Municipal Guangfu Elementary School: “There is stricter traffic control around the festival area. Police from the Xinyi Precinct spent a lot of time surveying the area around the school to help us go through this period of time. There are some impacts during school hours more or less, but we have put in a lot of personnel to relieve the impact.”

Chiang Wan-an, Taipei City Mayor: “Indeed there are some detailed areas where we could do better. People have reflected on us about some problems. There is still another week of the festival so we will try to improve on the problems that people have told us about.”

In response to problems of flow through the festival site, Chiang said he has visited the festival himself and experienced the problems. He said he would make as many improvements as possible for the rest of the festival till Feb. 19.

 

傍晚時刻，國父紀念館旁的道路開始出現車流，緊鄰會場的光復國小校外的人行道也開始出現要去看花燈的人流，而課後班學生正要下課。由於學校鄰近台灣燈會的國父紀念館會場，人潮滿滿，有家長擔心活動噪音影響上課，也擔心學生上下課受到衝擊。為了防止車潮、人流影響這些學生下課，校方也首度開放讓家長進到校門內，好接孩子下課，避開干擾。

家長說：「學校有調整了嘛，他把原本在門口往裡面移了，所以基本上就沒有太大影響。」

家長說：「老師也有LINE上提醒家長這樣，所以就是讓我們進入校園的這邊接送，所以就比較安心。」

對此，校方表示燈會開始前，警方有來幫忙會勘，請學校做部分的彈性調整，家長會也投入大量人力協助，希望家長及學生，共體時艱。

台北市光復國小校長賴俊賢說：「車子停好，然後進來我們校內的接送區來做接送，信義分局這邊也都派了很足夠的警察來幫我們維持交管的措施。」

台北市長蔣萬安說：「的確當然有些細節的部分 ，我們可以做得更好，那民眾也有給我們一些反映，我想燈會還有一個星期，我們都會就民眾反應的部分，加速的來改善。」

台北市長蔣萬安，13日一早到松山國小，關心孩子上學情況。由於燈會還有一週，對於媒體追問燈會動線等的問題，蔣萬安強調，自己有實際走訪燈會，看一下動線規劃，以及人潮、車流，的確有些細節，可以做得更好，希望就民眾的反映，加速改善，將燈會做得更好。