Taipei, July 17 (CNA) Some scenic sites and theme parks in Taiwan were open on a weekend for the first time Saturday since being closed in mid-May, but attendance at many of the attractions was limited and road traffic only increased slightly.
In northern Taiwan, the Manyueyuan Forest Recreation Area in New Taipei and the Dongyanshan Forest Recreation Area in Taoyuan both saw visitor numbers reach the cap of 700 people after 10 a.m., and crowd control measures were put in place to limit entry, said Forestry Bureau official Cheng Yi-chuan.
Cheng said people planning to visit the areas run by the bureau, which charges an entry fee, can check the Taiwan Forest Recreation's Chinese-language website to see whether an area is full or not.
Meanwhile, theme parks in central Taiwan, which had been closed since May 19, when the government raised the nationwide COVID-19 alert to Level 3 to tackle a sudden outbreak, said they were ready to welcome back visitors with extra disease prevention measures in place.
Both Lihpao Resort in Taichung and Janfusun Fancyworld in Yunlin require people to make a booking before they visit, while Leofoo Village in Hsinchu, which has a capacity of 12,000 visitors, is only allowing 3,000 people to enter.
Lihpao said it had visitors from Taoayuan and Tainan on Saturday morning, with the number of bookings reaching around 800 at 10 a.m., still short of the reduced capacity of 1,800 calculated under the government guidelines.
The reopening of outdoor leisure venues began on July 13, with visitors still needing to comply with current COVID-19 restrictions, including social distancing and wearing a face mask outside one's home.
Janfushan, the capacity of which is capped at 2,500, said it recorded bookings of fewer than 400 on Saturday, while Leofoo said it expected to receive over 1,000 visitors during the day.
Meanwhile, extra policemen were in place in anticipation of people flocking to Hehuanshan in Nantou, but "the number of visitors is much lower than expected," said one officer.
In Kaohsiung, the Chengcing Lake Scenic Area run by Taiwan Water Corp., recorded 2,000 visitors between 6 a.m. and noon, with a cap of 2,800 in place, the company said.
Meanwhile, traffic on Taiwan's roads remained relatively smooth.
Except for the section between Shiding and Pinglin in New Taipei on National Freeway No. 5 to Yilan, which saw traffic slow to below 40 kilometers per hour Saturday afternoon, the speed on most freeways remained above 60 kph, Freeway Bureau data showed.
Traffic to Kenting in Pingtung was light, according to local police, as beaches remain closed to the public. Vendors at the Kenting night market said there were not many customers Friday -- the first night of their trial reopening this weekend.
In Hualien, local police said several outdoor attractions did not see many visitors, while several famous eateries had lines of customers outside.
Farglory Ocean Park in Hualien, which also requires people to pre-book their visit, said it had more than 500 visitors on Saturday.
Trains saw an increase in passengers with the lifting of some of the restrictions on July 13.
Average daily ridership on Taiwan Railways Administration trains rose 15.5 percent to 173,100 between July 13 and July 15 from a week earlier, the railway operator said, but it was still 69.2 percent lower than the daily figure of 562,000 before the current outbreak began in mid-May.
