Fenced off from marches
In order to reinforce governmental authority, when the ROC government moved to Taiwan, it drew a military district around the Presidential Palace, taking Chunghwa Road, Aikuo West Road, Chungshan South Road, Changte Street, Kungyuan Road, Hsiangyang Road, Huaining Street, and Hengyang Road as its boundaries. (This was the district before martial law ended in 1987. Its boundaries represent a complete inheritance, as the district includes almost all of the central government buildings of the Japanese era.) Whenever protest marchers take to the streets, the area is fenced off. Interestingly, the ROC government has changed virtually none of the architecture within this district, and many of the buildings have even continued to serve their same functions. And so in order to understand the spatial relationships between the various buildings within this special district, we've got to go back 100 years to the Japanese era.
In 1884, today's Chunghwa Road, Aikuo West Road, Chungshan South Road and Chunghsiao West Road were the sites of the just-constructed walls protecting Taipei City. Construction proceeded at the command of the Ching governor Liu Ming-chuan, and by about 1891 the facilities inside the city were nearing completion. At that time, to lend support to coastal defenses in Keelung and Tanshui, the center of Taipei was further north, around shop-lined Shihfang Street and the Ching Governor's Taipei Palace (between today's Kaifeng and Hankou streets). Nearby road names are often descriptions of their position relative the palace, such as Fuchien (or "in front of the palace") Road. To the south of Shihfang Street was an expanse of state-owned rice paddies punctuated by only a few public buildings and private lands.
First take, then build
Five years after the Ching facilities were finished, the city was turned over to the Japanese. Between 1895 and 1900, because government authority had not yet been firmly established and because of problems with land rights, the Japanese did not proceed with new construction. They took possession of only the lands that had belonged to the Ching court, and most of these were used for military purposes.
For example, an artillery corps was stationed at the Ching Governor's Office; the office of the Ching civil and financial administrator became the temporary office for the governor-general (now the site of Chungshan Hall); the mandarin examination hall at the northeast corner of the city was used as barracks; and the Confucian Temple became a hospital (now the site of Taipei First Girl's High School).
After 1900, the Japanese began to rebuild Taipei, starting first by tearing down the city's four walls. In the view of Huang Chun-ming, an associate professor of architecture at Chung Yuan Christian University, they did this because they got sick of the wasted time and effort of tearing holes through the walls every time they laid a new road. They figured they might as well just tear down the whole thing, using the salvaged stone as a material for the public structures they were building. These grey rocks from the Peishih Lake on Tachih Mountain can still be seen in Chinan Church and the wall around Taiwan University Hospital.
Hsu Yu-chien, the chairman of the Department of Architecture at the Hua Fan College of Humanities and Technology, believes that at first the Japanese didn't have a complete blueprint for how they wanted to build up Taipei because they didn't announce a true city plan until 1928. Although there was a 1905 plan for the city and its environs, which originally called for three camphor- and maplelined boulevards to extend out from the ruins of the city wall, it didn't contain any plans for making over the old buildings and streets. At the most the 1905 plan could be called a suggested "change of course" that was mostly concerned with city scenery.
A show colony
Nevertheless, what's certain is that "the Japanese government was very clear that it wanted to build parks and a governor-general's residence, and to work hard at finding a site for the future Gover-nor-General's Office," Huang says. Hsu points out why: "So that they could show off a modern Taipei as a credit to their colonial rule."
In order to avoid the problems of buying private land, the Japanese decided to make their base the public lands in the then sparsely populated East Gate District.
And so in 1901, when the Governor-General's Residence was completed (now the Taipei Guest House), it was luxuriously expansive and well appointed. The Japanese craftsmen designed the space imitating the baroque style in order to show their noble authority. Widening Tungmen Street, which originally led through the East Gate, they left the Gate as the center of a traffic circle, so as to make it convenient for military parades as well as every-day horses and carriages. Full of traffic, the road was very impressive.
To show the governor-general's supremacy, they selected a site for his office that was occupied by the Lin and Chen clan shrines, which were forced to move. This spot was at the end of a big road, which in the grammar of architecture makes buildings appear more magnificent. And designing a plaza in front of the building was naturally done with military displays in mind. These would also serve to intimidate the colonials.
Although the Japanese government did not restrict people from entering the building and holding activities in the neighborhood, they did ban the speaking of Taiwanese and required that people wear shoes and wear pants at least as low as the calves--regulations that served to keep most of the native Taiwanese population out.
The calls of the crowd
The road leading to the Governor-General's Office (now Chiehshou Road) was lined with the residences of high-ranking Japanese officials. The Japanese government grouped the residences of its officials according to their level in the hierarchy. These residences were built out of wood in the traditional Japanese style, and after the restoration of the island to the ROC, they were torn down.
The uses of the public parks even more display the Japanese plans for establishing a model culture here. They tore down the Matsu Temple, which was the center of religious life in Taipei, and built Kodama Goto Memorial Hall (honoring the fourth Governor-General Kodama Gentaro and Senior Minister Goto Shinpei). Western classical music was played on the hall's open-air stage all day long. All sorts of celebrations were also held here, as was the incomparably famous World Expo. When the crown prince and a royal entourage came to Taiwan for it, the slogan-mouthing crowds that gathered in New Park were not a whit less impressive than those that have gathered there every year on October 10 since retrocession.
The governor-general was responsible directly to the Japanese emperor, and so Taiwan's system of administration was like a small overseas central government. In April of 1896, the Japanese government set the structure of the colonial government. From the revisions they made every two years, you can see how the government's workload was swelling. Finding more room for the growing bureaucracy became one of its most pressing problems.
Power and proximity
The highest-ranking officials worked to the west of the Governor General's Office. The Civil Engineering Bureau (whose Department of Construction was responsible for designing all of the architecture within the district), the Taipei Telephone Bureau (which was originally a museum) and the Taipei Power Company were built one after another. The Bank of Taiwan, which was responsible for the colony's economy, and the High Court were then put in new buildings on either side of the Governor General's Office. By this point, the layout of today's Po Ai District had already taken shape.
If you look at the relationship between power and space in the district, you can detect some symbolic meanings. Chiang Po-wei, a student in a doctoral program of architecture and urban and rural planning at Taiwan University, says that generally speaking the closer something was to the Governor-General's Office the more direct its relationship to the governor-general's power.
Take the Bank of Taiwan and the High Court on either side of the Governor-General's Office: They represented the two most useful tools the Japanese had in their rule of Taiwan. The Japanese wanted to copy the three-sided model of division of power in Western governments, but imperialists have no use for colonial legislatures. On the one hand, through the Bank of Taiwan the government lent great sums of capital to large Japanese firms to seize such important Taiwan resources as rice and sugar cane; and on the other hand they controlled the administration of justice, funding many police so as to keep an eye on the people. By facing east with their backs to the Tanshui River, the three buildings smash Chinese geomantical taboos about water at the backs of buildings, and by facing east they also exalt the glory and power of the Japanese empire. In addition, the Taipei Park (now New Park) was placed near the Governor-General's Office so as to enable the governor-general to easily enjoy the fruits of Japanese rule. And while the students at the Japanese girls school (formerly the site of a hospital and now the Taipei First Girls High School) were taught social etiquette and homemaking skills, their lessons also inculcated them with the idea that their husbands-to-be were the rulers of Taiwan. Thus, the Japanese went about strengthening every layer of their power structure from within and without.
The more things change...
If you extend the line of time a little further, making comparisons with the way the ROC used this space after the retrocession of Taiwan, you will find more of history's tracks. Time has not wrought major changes to the special character of space in the Po Ai district, but you can trace the constant advance of history in the changes in the way it is being used.
When the ROC central government moved to Taiwan in 1949, the Bank of Taiwan regained the functions of a central bank it had in the Japanese era, changing the district currency it issued into the New Taiwan Dollar. Chang Hsing-wu, director of secretarial services at the Central Bank of China, recalls that the government thought it would soon retake the mainland, and so it didn't allow the Central Bank set up operations on Taiwan. Hence, many of the functions of a central bank (such as issuing foreign exchange certificates, printing money and stewardship of the national treasury) were temporarily commissioned to the Bank of Taiwan, giving it the same importance it had in the Japanese era.
It wasn't until 1962 that the Central Bank resumed its operations and the importance of the Taiwan Bank started to decline. But because the Central Bank could not find space within the Po Ai District, it had to build its headquarters on Roosevelt Road (Section One) on land originally held by the KMT and the Monopoly Bureau. The changing relative power of the Taiwan Bank and Central Bank of China vis-a-vis their spatial relationship is worthy of contemplation.
The Governor-General's Residence, which was only second in importance to the Governor-General's Office during the Japanese Era, became the Taipei Guest House, which is used to hold receptions for guests of state. But since the construction of the Grand Hotel, the guest house's importance in presenting a face for the nation has been on the wane.
The Monopoly Bureau (now the Taiwan Tobacco and Wine Bureau) had the right to sell all of Taiwan's important natural resources during the Japanese era. Because it was only an administrative unit, it wasn't near the center of authority by the Governor-general's Office. Today it is next to the building now being used as the president's residence and is receiving more thorough protection. But with the ROC preparing to enter GATT, the days when the bureau can monopolize sales of tobacco and alcohol are numbered, and there is much talk about its disbandment.
Since retrocession the Po Ai District has served to convey the same basic symbols of authority it did before. which can be seen from all sorts of unwritten rules.
For example, the public is allowed to walk through the Po Ai district, but mindful of being watched, everyone's mood naturally grows more solemn upon entering it. People talk in hushed tones and don't linger--let alone line up and make a lot of noise (the only exception being the music corps responsible for handling the daily flag raising and lowering ceremonies). And Chiehshou Road is only open to motorcycles and pedestrians before, during and after the National Day celebrations on October 10 and during the Chinese New Year. Usually only cars can use it.
One floor lower
There is also a regulation governing the height of nearby buildings. One of the ways the Presidential Palace symbolically conveys its authority is through its height. And so after the ROC government moved to Taipei, it ordered that no structure in the district could be built higher than the Presidential Palace. Even the vast majority of buildings nearby the district respected the rule. And there are also special regulations for any nearby windows with a clear view of the Presidential Palace.
While the Supreme Court, finished in 1991, is eight stories tall, it is only as tall as most seven-story buildings because buildings cannot be any taller than 24 meters in this district. And so its design called for low ceilings.
Yet this hard and fast law now only holds within the district. Just beyond its borders, anything goes.
Taiwan University Hospital, a neighbor of the Po Ai district, was built higher than the Presidential Palace. It also has many windows facing west towards the palace, for which it makes a bevy of technical excuses by pulling down window shades, darkening the color of windows or even making it impossible to open some windows.
What's more, in 1993 a private financial consortium built the nearby Shin Kong Life Tower, a 53-story skyscraper that has already become a new symbol of the city. And the new 12-story KMT party headquarters is to be located by the East Gate directly across from the Presidential Palace. The Po Ai District is gradually being enclosed amid a concrete jungle of modern skyscrapers.
Chang Yen-hsien, a researcher at the Academia Sinica's Sun Yat-sen Institute for Social Sciences and Philosophy, believes that this phenomenon shows that the authority of the Presidential Palace is not as clear as it once was. People used not to have the capital to build high rises, and even if they had the financial resources, the relevant authorities might not grant them permission. Now the power of the people in Taiwan is on the rise (especially their economic power), and they no longer need always to kowtow to government authority.
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The Po Ai district covers the southern half of what used to be called the "central city" district in the Japanese occupation era; it has been the location of governmental power since those days.(courtesy of the Southern Materials Center)
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