Tainan

Sankanten Shrine (三崁店社)

Over the last few months of 2024, I spent a lot of my time completely encapsulated in a project that required a tremendous amount of research, translation, and searching for the physical locations of the well-over four hundred Shinto Shrines that were constructed in Taiwan during the half century period of Japanese Colonial rule. Instead of going out and taking photos, or making an effort to write about the ever-increasing backlog of articles that I have on my list of locations to introduce to all of you, I spent a countless number of hours at coffee shops and at home working on this project, which I’ve yet to complete.

Having spent so much time on the project, I eventually decided I needed to take a break, to relax my brain, and work on something else. Taking a look at my long list of articles to write, I thought I’d choose a couple of places that I could write about quickly, so that I could get back to work on my shrine project during the Lunar New year holiday. Hilariously, I’m probably a glutton for punishment, but the first place I chose to write about in my downtime would be an article about the ruins of a historic Shinto Shrine.

I rationalized this decision by telling myself that with all of this information fresh in my mind, I’d be able to complete this article relatively quickly, and then be able to move onto something else. Whether or not that’ll actually be the case remains unclear, but here we go. Today, I’ll be introducing the ruins of a Shinto Shrine in Tainan, and one that is currently undergoing a restoration project by the local government.

For the average reader, or the average tourist, the ruins of a Japanese-era shrine are probably pretty low on the priority list of places to visit, which is something that I completely understand that, especially given how many historic tourist destinations there are in Tainan. But for my part, documenting this piece of history is pretty important given that of the hundreds of shrines that were constructed around the island during that fifty year period, more than 95% of them have been completely destroyed.

The shrine I’ll be introducing today is located on the outskirts of Tainan City, on the grounds of a historic sugar factory. Constructed for use by the staff at the sugar factory, and for the students at a school that was constructed for the convenience of the factory’s employees. These days, if you take a look at Google Maps, you’ll see that the shrine is officially referred to in English as the ‘Yongkang Sankandian Sugar Refinery Shinto Shrine Remains’ (永康三崁店糖廠神社遺蹟), a bit of a long one, if you’re asking me, but it does tell you a lot, all of which I’ll explain below.

I’ll start by introducing the the history of the Yongkang Sankanten Sugar Factory, then I’ll provide an introduction to the shrine’s history and its architectural design, the kami who were enshrined within, and what you’ll see today if you visit.

Yongkang Sankanten Sugar Factory (永康三崁店糖廠)

It would be an understatement to say that the cultivation of cane sugar over the past century has played an instrumental role in Taiwan’s economic development. Even though sugarcane isn’t a native crop to Taiwan, it adapted well to southern Taiwan’s climate and soil, and its cultivation, while perfected by the Japanese, was something that actually starting bringing wealth to the island hundreds of year before.

The history of sugarcane cultivation in Taiwan got its start during the short-lived Kingdom of Tungning Era (東寧王國) between 1661 and 1683, and was something that was continued during Qing rule as it became a precious trading commodity with western powers. When the Japanese took control of Taiwan in 1895, the cultivation and refinement of sugarcane was something that would quickly mature, and quickly go into overdrive. During that fifty year period, more than forty factories were constructed by over a dozen companies, mostly spread throughout southern Taiwan.

Map with Sankenten Sugar Refinery in the 1930s

What’s even more amazing, and probably difficult for a lot of people to understand is that for the benefit of Taiwan’s sugar industry, more than 3000 kilometers of private railways were constructed to transport sugarcane to factories, and then the finished product, ranging from sugar, molasses, fertilizers, ethanol, etc. were put onto the main railway line to be exported around the world.

One of those early sugar factories was constructed in the Yongkang (永康) area of Tainan in 1906, by a British firm who named the factory, ‘the Bain & Company Sugary Refinery’ (ベィン商會製糖場). The factory was later purchased by the ‘Formosa Sugar and Development Company, Ltd’, which invested in modern production machinery, which helped to increase the factory’s output. However, just a few years after the group purchased the factory, it was devastated by the 1911 Formosa Typhoon (1911年台灣南部颱風), which put construction to a sudden halt. Shortly after the typhoon, the Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台湾製糖株式会社 / たいわんせいとう), which would have been the largest sugar company in Taiwan at the time, took control of the factory and renamed it the ‘Sankanten Sugar Refinery’ (三崁店製糖場).

Working in conjunction with the nearby Shiyaroken Sugar Refinery (車路墘製糖所), Wanri Sugar Refinery (灣裡製糖所) and the Shanhua Sugar Factory (善化糖廠), Tainan’s refineries quickly became the most profitable on the island, which over the next few decades would allow their growth to continue. By the 1930s, the Sankanten Refinery had more or less constructed its own self-sustaining community with housing provided to its employees and a school for their children. The factory not only constructed a school for the children of its employees, but they also allocated space and funds to construct a shrine for the staff and the local community.

Note: This is something that I’ll explain a bit later, but it’s important to note that it became quite common, and almost necessary in some cases, during the Japanese-era for private companies to construct shrine on the grounds of their factories. These shrines were classified as ‘private’ or ‘Factory Shrines’ (工場の構內社 / こうしょうのこうないしゃ), but one of the reasons why you rarely see them counted in the total number of shrines in Taiwan is due to the fact that they weren’t always officially recognized by the government.

When the Japanese surrendered control of Taiwan after the Second World War, sugar production continued under the control of the Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台灣糖業股份有限公司), a state-run enterprise that to this day remains one of the most prosperous companies in the nation. That being said, there has been a massive decline in the production of sugar in Taiwan, and the number of sugar factories has declined from forty-two to just three. Similarly, the vast majority of the 3000 kilometers of railway that was constructed for the sugar factories have since been removed, and in a lot of cases have been replaced by roads for cars.

The Sankanten Factory continued production until 1990 (民國79年), when its management was merged with the nearby Shanhua Factory, but just three years later, it would officially shut down.

Taking into consideration that these sugar factories have been an important part of Taiwan’s economic miracle, you’ll find that a few of the larger factories around the country have since been repurposed into cultural parks, and there are several in Tainan that have become quite interesting for tourists. The Sankanten Factory, however, wasn’t afforded such preservation, and today the land where it once stood is home to a transport and logistics company. Still, if you take some time, you can find some of the historic parts of the factory remaining near the shrine, most notably its air-raid shelters.

Sankanten Shrine (三崁店社 / さんかんてんしゃ)

Compared to the more than 33,000 places of worship you’ll find scattered across Taiwan today, it might not be so impressive when I tell you that the nation was once home to more than four-hundred Shinto Shrines. The staggering number of religious sites in Taiwan is one that is actually difficult to keep track of, because they’re constantly being constructed. Still, in the half century that the Japanese controlled Taiwan, the construction of shrines was likely only comparable to what has taken place across the country in the past few decades.

Another one of the similarities between the number of places of worship in Taiwan today, and during the Japanese-era, is that the majority of shrines (something that I alluded to earlier) that were constructed around the island were considered either ‘official’, ‘unofficial’ or ‘private’ whereas today they’re simply designated as ‘official’ and ‘unofficial’

To expand on that point, the larger, officially-ranked shrines, such as the Taoyuan Shrine (桃園神社), for example, were constructed mostly with public funding by the colonial government, and their management was something that was tightly controlled. Taiwan was home to about a hundred of these officially ranked shrines divided between Imperial Ranked Shrines (官幣社), Nationally Ranked Shrines (国幣社), County-Level Shrines (縣社) and District-Level Shrines (郷社). and Unranked Shrines.

However, these ‘official’ shrines made up less than a quarter of the total number of shrines that were constructed around the island, with the vast majority of them considered ‘unrecognized’ or ‘unranked’ (無格社), and were located within indigenous villages, educational institutions, factories, military bases, etc.

Suffice to say, almost every Sugar Factory constructed around the island had its own on-site Shinto Shrine, set up for the benefit of its employees, and for the economic success of the business. The shrines that were set up within these factories tended to be quite small, and unlike the larger ranked shrines, it was uncommon for them to have staff at the shrine. In most cases, the responsibility for the upkeep of the shrine rested upon the staff at the factory, with the local community volunteering to help maintain them.

The Sankenten Sugar Factory made an official application with the government to construct an on-site shrine, and once it was approved, construction started on October 25th, 1930 (昭和5年), with a budget of 2800 Yen (Approximately 30,000USD in modern currency). Construction was completed a few months later on May 16th, 1931 (昭和6年), and was officially named Sankenten Shrine (三崁店社 / さんかんてんしゃ).

Note: The Japanese pronunciation of the area is ‘Sankanten’ (さんかんてん), while the Mandarin pronunciation is ‘Sankengdian’ (三坑店), which is quite similar. You’re likely to see it referred to by the latter romanization today.

What’s somewhat unclear about the establishment of the shrine is whether the enshrinement ceremony took place on May 18th or May 20th. What we do know, though, is that the shrine’s annual Spring Festival (例祭 / れいさい) was held on October 10th or 18th, and Harvest Festivals (祈年祭 / きねんさい) were held several times throughout the year.

What happened to the shrine after the Second World War isn’t entirely clear, with parts of the shrine removed, vandalized or destroyed. At some point, a post office was constructed on the elevated cement section of the shrine, but it didn’t seem to last very long as it was probably torn down when the sugar factory was shut down in the early 1990s.

Ultimately, the grounds were left in ruins after the closure of the factory, and it was eventually overtaken by the natural environment. In 2009 (民國98年), the shrine grounds were recognized by the Tainan City Government as a Protected Historic Property (直轄市定古蹟), which meant that efforts would have to be undertaken to have the site preserved. With the amount of historic properties in Tainan, though, there was a long list of other historic properties that required funding for restoration. Ultimately it took more than a decade for the restoration of the shrine to start.

As I’m writing, the restoration process is still on-going, but should be completed in the near future. So, if you’re in the area and you take the time to visit, you’re likely to encounter the ruins of a shrine that hasn’t been as well-kept since the 1940s!

I’ll end this section by sharing an interesting story about the restoration of the shrine.

In the decades since the Japanese surrendered control of Taiwan, the vandalism and destruction of cultural and religious elements from that period of Taiwan’s history has become common. There are, of course, very understandable reasons for this. That being said, even though there are people who elect to destroy these relics of Taiwan’s heritage, you’ll also find people who are actively engaged in preserving these things.

In this specific case, when the Sankenten Shrine was officially recognized for preservation, a former volunteer at the shrine (at least that’s how it was explained) contacted the government to let them know that they had taken it upon themselves to preserve the shrine’s name pillar, which was originally thought to been destroyed. The individual returned the pillar to the government, and it was locked away for safe-keeping.

Today, a beautifully reproduced shrine pillar stands on the grounds identifying that this was once the Sankenten Shrine.

Link: 古蹟「三崁店社」石柱 重見天日 (自由時報)

Kami Enshrined at Sankanten Shrine

When it comes to the kami who were enshrined within Sankanten Shrine, there’s not much of a variation with those who were enshrined at the hundreds of other shrines constructed across Taiwan. The Japanese were initially quite selective with the kami they chose to promote in Taiwan, and were mostly deities, who the people of Taiwan could relate to, given that within Taiwanese folk religion, you’ll find similar figures.

As a colony, the government placed considerable emphasis on Taiwan’s agricultural and natural resources, and for much of the half century of Japanese rule, they offered massive incentives for farmers to come to the island to contribute, especially since a lot of the farmland in Japan was being industrialized at the time. Moreover, within Sugar Factories, like the Sankanten Factory, the kami chosen for these shrines, were those that offered spiritual assistance to people working in this sector.

The following were the five kami originally enshrined at Sankanten Shrine:

  • The Three Deities of Cultivation (開拓三神 / かいたくさんじん)

    The Three Deities of Cultivation, consist of three figures known for their skills with regard to nation-building, farming, business and medicine. 

    The Three Deities of Cultivation are as follows: 

    1. Okunitama no Mikoto (大國魂大神 / おおくにたまのかみ)

    2. Okuninushi no Mikoto (大名牟遲大神 / おおなむちのかみ)

    3. Sukunabikona no Mikoto (少彥名大神 / すくなひこなのかみ)

    While these deities are also quite common among Japan’s Shinto Shrines, they were especially important here in Taiwan due to what they represented, which included aspects of nation-building, agriculture, medicine and the weather. Given Taiwan’s position as a new addition to the Japanese empire, ‘nation-building’ and the association of a Japanese-style way of life was something that was being pushed on the local people in more ways than one.

    Likewise, considering the economy at the time was largely agricultural-based, it was important that the gods enshrined reflected that aspect of life. 

    Toyoke no Omikami (豐受大神 / トヨウケビメノカミ) 

    ‘Toyoke no Omikami’ is a female kami hailing from Japanese mythology. Known simply as the Japanese ‘Goddess of Food,’ she is more formally referred to as the ‘Kami of Agriculture and Industry’ serving a role similar to the Three Pioneer kami mentioned above.

    Residing at the Ise Grand Shrine (伊勢神宮), one of her roles is to provide food for her counterpart, the sun goddess Amaterasu (天照大神), which means that when you encounter a shrine dedicated to Amaterasu, you’re also very likely to find a shrine dedicated to Toyoke no Omikami, as well.

    Link: Toyouke-hime (Wiki)

    Prince Kitashirakawa Yoshihisa (北白川宮能久親王)

    Prince Yoshihisa, a western educated Major-General in the Japanese Imperial Army, and a member of the Japanese imperial family was commissioned to participate in the invasion of Taiwan after the island was ceded to the empire.  Unfortunately for the Prince, he contracted malaria and died in either modern day Hsinchu or Tainan (where he died is disputed), giving him the dubious honor of being the first member of the Japanese royal family to pass away while outside of Japan in more than nine hundred years, in addition to being the first to die in war. 

    Shortly after his death he was elevated to the status of a ‘kami’ under state Shinto and was given the name “Kitashirakawa no Miya Yoshihisa-shinno no Mikoto“, and subsequently became one of the most important patron deities here in Taiwan, as well as being enshrined at the Yasukuni Shrine (靖國神社) in Tokyo. Of the more than four-hundred shrines constructed around Taiwan during the Japanese-era, its safe to say that Prince Yoshihisa was enshrined within at least ninety percent of them, making him one of the most prolific kami in Taiwan.

    Link: Prince Kitashirakawa Yoshihisa (Wiki)

Even though I’ve already detailed most of the important events that led up to the construction of the sugar factory, its shrine, and what happened after the Japanese-era, I’ve gone ahead and put together a concise timeline of events below. For anyone interested in a summarized look at the shrine’s history, click the drop-down box below:

    • 1906 (明治39年) - A British firm constructed a sugar refinery in the Sankanten area of Taiwan with an investment of 200,000 Yen, under the name ‘The Bain & Company Sugary Refinery” (ベィン商會製糖場) with a production capacity of about 300 tons.

    • 1909 (明治42年) - The Bain & Company shifts its focus from the production of sugar to honey and sells its shares of the factory to the ‘Formosa Sugar and Development Company, Ltd’, which invested a further 80,000 Yen in the latest machinery, increasing the factory’s output to 850 tons.

    • 1911 (明治44年) - The 1911 Formosa Typhoon (1911年台灣南部颱風) causes considerable damage in Southern Taiwan, resulting in 290 deaths, and also considerably damages the sugar factory. As a result, the Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台湾製糖株式会社 / たいわんせいとう) took control of the factory and oversaw its repairs. The factory was once again upgraded to a production capacity of 1200 tons, making the three Tainan factories the most profitable on the island. It was also at this time that the refinery was formally renamed the Sankenten Sugar Refinery (三崁店製糖場).

    • 1919 (大正8年) - Due to the growth and the the profitability of the sugar factory, a school is constructed nearby for the benefit of the children of its employees. The Sankanten Branch of the Tainan First Elementary school (臺南第一小學校三崁店分教場) opened for the 1919 school year.

    • 1920 (大正9年) - In April, the sugar factory’s school becomes independent of the Tainan First Elementary School and is renamed the Sankenten Normal Elementary School (三崁店尋常小學校).

    • 1930 (昭和5年) - Construction work on a shrine for the sugar factory officially starts on October 25th with a budget of about 2800 Yen (About 30,000USD in modern currency).

    • 1931 (昭和6年) - Construction is completed on May 16th, with the enshrinement ceremony taking place a few days later, either on May 18th or May 20th.

    • 1993 (民國82年) - The Yongkang Sugar Factory formally ends operations.

    • 2009 (民國98年) - The shrine is recognized as a Protected Historic Property (直轄市定古蹟) on May 27th.

    • 2012 (民國101年) - Once thought to have been vandalized and destroyed, the Sankenten Shrine’s Shrine Pillar (標柱 / しめばしら) was returned to the Tainan Bureau of Cultural Affairs by volunteers who had taken it upon themselves to have the historic marker preserved. However, the pillar that you’ll find on the grounds today is a replica.

    • 2024 (民國113年) - The restoration project of the Sankenten Shrine Ruins (三崁店糖廠神社遺跡) gets underway with efforts to clean up the site, repair damaged parts of the shrine, and reproduce some of the elements of the shrine that have been lost. The project was funded by the Tainan City Cultural Assets Management Office (台南市文化資產管) with a budget of about 10,000,000NTD.

Architectural Design

There are many things that can be said about the Japanese during their fifty-year period of rule over Taiwan, both negative and positive, but as far as I’m concerned, one of the more admirable aspects of that period of Taiwan’s history, given the technology, is that they were great at documenting things with photos. Obviously, the camera technology of the day wasn’t anything even remotely similar to what we have today, so the concerted effort that was made to take photos of what was happening in Taiwan in those days is something that we can appreciate today. Such is the case that now, whenever I write about one of Taiwan’s historic buildings, its usually easy to find photos of how it looked more than a century ago. This goes for both buildings constructed during that era, but also temples and other places of worship that predated the Japanese-era.

That being said, writing about the Sankenten Shrine’s architectural design hasn’t been an easy task. I’ve spent a lot of time looking, but there aren’t any photos of the shrine in its original state to be found. However, given the layout that we can still see today, historic record, and what would have been rather typical for shrines like this, I’m confident that I can offer readers a good indication of how the shrine originally appeared with a comprehensive list of all of the pieces that made it whole.

Below, I’ll start by introducing each specific part of the shrine, and then I’ll move onto some of the more in-depth design specifics, offering some illustrations of the style of architectural design that was used to construct it.

The first thing to remember about the Sankenten Shrine is that it was located on the grounds of a factory, and like the vast majority of Taiwan’s Shinto Shrines that were located on school grounds or on the grounds of a private company, it was considerably smaller than a full-fledged shrine. Despite its relative size, though, the shrine included quite a few important elements that you’ll find at most Shinto Shrines.

  • Visiting Path (參道 / さんどう) - The Visiting Path included a stone pathway to the shrine, a stone ‘shimebashira’ (標柱 / しめばしら) shrine pillar at the entrance, indicating the name of the shrine, a shrine gate (鳥居 / とりい), six sets of stone lanterns (石燈籠 / しゃむしょ) lining both sides of the path, a flag pole (竿 / さお), and a set of komainu (狛犬 / こまいぬ) lion-dog guardians.

  • Purification Fountain (手水舍 / ちょうずしゃ) - located on the western side of the Visiting Path, the Purification Fountain was a simple stone water fountain where visitors could perform a purification ritual prior to worshiping at the shrine.

  • Shrine Fence (玉垣 / たまがき) - a small stone fence that surrounded the sacred area of the shrine, preventing people from wandering into a space where they shouldn’t be.

  • Main Hall (本殿 / ほんでん) - Elevated on a ‘kidan’ (基壇 / きだん) stone platform, the Main Hall was a small wooden structure that was the home of the shrine’s kami.

With an idea of what once existed at the shrine, its time to talk about what continues to exist today.

Starting with the traditional Visiting Path, otherwise known as the “sando” (さんどう), this is an essential aspect of the layout of shrines, no matter how large or small they are. To the average person, the path may just seem like a long walkway that leads visitors to the shrine, but these paths actually serve both functional and symbolic purposes. In Japanese, the word ‘Shinto’ can be translated literally into English as the “Pathway to the Gods” (神道),  so the “path” is one that you take on the road to spiritual purification, and the path contains several elements that assist with that journey.

In this case, the original stone path that led to the shrine remains intact, which is great for helping people better understand the original layout of the shrine. At the entrance to the Visiting Path, you’ll find the shrine pillar (標柱 / しめばしら), a replication, as I mentioned earlier, with the name of the shrine ‘Sankenten Shrine’ (三坑店社) written in Kanji horizontally on the front.

Just beyond the pillar, you’ll find pedestals on either side of the stone path, which were once the home of the shrine’s pair of stone guardians. Whether they have been vandalized, stolen, or destroyed is unknown, but all that remains today is their cement pedestals. That being said, in some cases, the stone guardians that once guarded the hundreds of Shinto Shrines around the country, most of which were beautifully crafted and quite expensive, can be found guarding the entrances of nearby temples. It’s possible that the shrine’s guardians are still performing their duties, but their location remains undocumented.

Similarly, all six sets of the original stone lanterns (石燈籠 / しゃむしょ) have either been removed or destroyed. However, one of the pedestals where the lanterns were located features the original shaft (竿 /さお) that connected to the base on the ground and was used to support the upper parts of the lantern. What’s surprising about the shaft is that it still has the inscribed words ‘Constructed in May of the 6th year of the Showa Era’ (昭和六年5月建之). What’s significant about this is that in most cases, these inscriptions referring to either the Meiji (明治), Taisho (大正) or Showa (昭和) eras of Japanese rule, have mostly been vandalized over the years.

In this case, May of the Sixth year of Emperor Showa’s reign refers 1931, and since the shrine was officially opened on either May 18th or May 20th of that year, the pedestal is one of the few markers that indicate the complete history of the shrine.

Just beyond the pedestals, where the first set of lanterns once existed, you’ll find two circular pieces of cement on either side of the path. These were originally part of the base that held up the shrine gate, which has also either been removed or destroyed. Following the path, there are another two sets of lanterns before you’ll encounter a space on the western side where the path branches off to where the purification fountain (手水舍 / ちょうずしゃ) is located. While the stone fountain itself remains on site, whether or not there was a roof-covered building surrounding it is a bit of mystery. Looking at the space around the fountain, though, there isn’t much evidence that there was once a cement base as there are in other areas of the shrine, so it’s likely that the fountain that you see now was a standalone part of the shrine.

Now, onto the main section of the shrine, the Visiting Path ends in a short set of stairs that visitors would have taken to the front of where the small shrine was originally located. The worship area of was elevated on a stone base, which still exists today, and the same goes for the stairs. The elevated worship space of the shrine features a cement shrine fence (玉垣 / たまがき) on all four sides. The fence is still there, but it looks like there has been some work done to restore it as its looks quite new.

One of the major differences between this shrine, and the larger more full-fledged shrines is that there weren’t dedicated buildings for the Hall of Worship (拜殿 /はいでん) and a Main Hall (本殿/ほんでん) behind it. Instead, the shrine was just a miniature version of a ‘Main Hall’ that was propped up on an elevated base, known as a ‘kidan’ (基壇 / きだん). The original shrine has long since been removed, but amazingly, the base remains in its original position.

Even though there aren’t any historic photos of the shrine available, what we do know is that it was constructed using the ‘shinmei' (神明造 / しんめいづくり) style of architectural design, which actually tells us a lot. The shinmei style is a spinoff of what is claimed to be a style of design that is more than two-thousand years old. Most commonly associated with the design of the Ise Grand Shrine (伊勢神宮 / いせじんぐう), arguably the most important Shinto Shrine in Japan, the ‘shinmei’ style is characterized by its extreme simplicity and antiquity, and is thought to imitate the design of Japan’s early rice granaries.

Link: Shinmei-zukuri | 神明造 中文 | 神明造 日文 (Wiki)

In this case, in lieu of a much larger building, the shrine made use of what is known as a ‘hokora’ (祠 / ほこら), which is essentially a miniature version of a much larger shrine, and shares similar architectural designs, albeit on a much smaller scale. In this style of design, these buildings tend to have a rectangular-shaped base, known as a ‘moya’ (母屋 / もや), which is surrounded by a ‘hisashi’ (廂) veranda on all four sides.

In the front, there would have been a narrow set of stairs in the center that led to the front door of the shrine, where the repository of the kami would have been placed. However, unlike in other styles of Japanese design, you wouldn’t have found pillars on the exterior of the building, which are typically there to support the weight of the roof.

In the Shinmei-style, the roofs that cover the buildings generally make use of the asymmetrical ‘kirizuma-yane’ (切妻屋根 / きりづまやね) gabled roof style of design, but even though the roof eclipses the base, the columns aren’t necessary because the ‘moya’ is able to support its weight. In modern times, these gabled roofs are typically covered with copper sheeting, cypress bark or Japanese cedar shingles, but since there isn’t any information regarding the materials used to construct the roof, it’s difficult to guess what was used. In terms of decorative elements, though, roofs that cover shinmei-style buildings are typically adorned with what are known as katsuogi (鰹木/かつおぎ) and chigi (千木 / ちぎ) ornaments.

To explain, the ‘katsuogi’ are long cylindrical timber-like pieces of wood that rest on the flat base of the roof. The ‘chigi’ on the other hand are located on the two gable ends and can be cut either horizontally or vertically, known as uchi-sogi (内削ぎ) and soto-sogi (外削ぎ), respectively. How they’re cut is determined by the kami who reside within the building, so even though we don’t have any photos of the original shrine, it’s easy to assume that they were cut vertically in the ‘uchi-soto’ style given that the kami within are predominately male deities.

Links: Katsuogi | Chigi (Wiki) 

Unfortunately, the best I can do is offer diagrams of this style of design to better help readers understand what once existed on top of the stone pedestal. Like most of the Shinto Shrines that were constructed around Taiwan, not much of the original shrine remains in place today, but in this case, there is more than enough to assist anyone who visits in understanding what once originally stood in this location, and as far as these things go, the ruins of the Sankenten Shrine is an excellent reminder of the past, and one of the more complete shrine experiences you’ll have in Taiwan today.

Getting There

 

Address: Intersection of Ren’ai Street and Sanmin Street, Yongkang District, Tainan City (臺南市永康區仁愛街與三民街交界)

GPS: 23.054472, 120.244833

Alright, now for the bad news. Unlike a lot of Tainan’s tourist destinations, without your own means of transportation, this one isn’t easy to visit.

The shrine ruins are located north of Tainan City in Yongkang District (永康區), and even though there’s a bus that can get you there from Tainan Station, it’s not convenient, and you may find yourself stuck in the middle of nowhere waiting for another one to come. So, if you don’t have a car or a scooter, I’m not sure how much I recommend the average tourist heading over to check it out.

Still, if you’re in the area and you insist on visiting, you have a couple of options for public transportation.

The first option is to take the train north from Tainan Station to Yongkang Station (永康車站) and from there hopping on a Youbike for the ten minute ride to the shrine. However, even though this seems like a relatively straight forward route, especially if you have access to Google Maps, you’ll have to cross some pretty busy roads, which in southern Taiwan tend to be dangerous, and not very pedestrian-friendly.

If you haven’t already, I highly recommend downloading the Youbike App to your phone so that you’ll have a better idea of the location where you’ll be able to find the closest docking station.

Link: Youbike - Apple / Android

The second option is to take Tainan Bus #21 (火車南站 - 永康工業區) from the Southern Side of the Tainan Train Station all the way to the Yongkang Industrial Park. However, if you take a look at the schedule, it’s important to note that the bus only comes eight times a day, which means that you may end up having to wait a while for another one to come by to pick you up.

Otherwise, the best option for getting around the more rural areas of Tainan City is to simply rent a scooter near the Tainan Train Station.

If you have a Taiwanese drivers license or an International Drivers License, you shouldn’t have much trouble. If you have neither, you might still find a rental company that is willing to rent to you, but driving without a license isn’t recommended, especially for insurance reasons.

My visit to the Sankenten Shrine ruins came at a time when the site was in the process of being restored by the city government. Personally, I would have preferred to have seen what the shrine was like prior to the start of the restoration process, so I could have experienced it in its original rundown state, but now that its been cleaned up, its much easier to see all the different aspects of the shrine that might have been missed due to overgrowth. I’m not sure what the future holds for the shrine ruins once it officially reopens, but I really hope they leave it more or less as it is.

References

  1. 三崁店社 中文 | 三崁店社 日文 (Wiki)

  2. 永康糖廠 (Wiki)

  3. 臺灣製糖 中文 | 台湾製糖 日文 (Wiki)

  4. 永康三崁店糖廠神社遺蹟 (台灣宗教文化資產)

  5. 永康三崁店糖廠神社遺蹟 (國家文化記憶庫)

  6. 永康三崁店糖廠神社遺蹟 (國家文化資產網)

  7. 永康三崁店糖廠神社遺蹟 (文化部)

  8. 台南古蹟三崁店神社 年底修復完成 (聯合新聞網)

  9. 古蹟「三崁店社」石柱 重見天日 (自由時報)

  10. 台南「三崁店糖廠神社遺跡」年底修復 蔣公堤功德碑「美容」中 (自由時報)

  11. shinmei-zukuri 神明造 (JAANUS)


Linfengying Station (林鳳營驛)

I was born an intolerant, at least, when it comes to lactose type things, and throughout my life, I’ve never really been able to enjoy anything made with dairy, without having to suffer the consequences. As I’ve grown up, it’s gotten much better, and my reactions to anything with dairy have become less serious, but you’re never going to see me with a glass of milk in my hand.

Despite my allergy, like most people in Taiwan, when I hear the words “Linfengying” (林鳳營), there’s pretty much only one thing that comes to mind, and that’s one of Taiwan’s most famous brands of milk.

I suppose you could say that the milk is so well-known that even a foreigner who is allergic to dairy knows about it and if you’ve been here long enough, its highly likely that you’ve seen their iconic commercials on the television, seen their advertisements on public transportation, or have seen a bunch of cartons being delivered to your favorite coffee shop.

Things haven’t been going so great for the brand in recent years, though.

In 2014, what has since become known as the ‘Gutter Oil Scandal’ (劣油事件) erupted around Taiwan, embroiling several of Taiwan’s largest food conglomerates, resulting in massive public anger, protests around the country, prison sentences, the recall of thousands of products, and the revelation that mass food adulteration by food conglomerates had been suppressed from the public for decades. The scandal, which involved 240 tons of ‘gutter oil’ affected a wide range of products on Taiwan’s shelves ranging from cooking oil, rice, milk and alcoholic beverages. It also affected thousands of restaurants around the country.

At the center of the scandal was Ting Hsin International (頂新集團), one of Taiwan’s largest food producers, with a long list of subsidiaries under its umbrella, including the famed Linfengying Milk (林鳳營牛奶).

Link: Food safety incidents in Taiwan (Wiki)

The scandal caused considerable damage to Taiwan’s international image, and products that were being exported to international markets were pulled. For their part, the people of Taiwan took to boycotts of products produced by the company, and in one particular case, known as “Operation Knockout” (滅頂行動), people went to Costco to purchase Lingfengying Milk, opened the package, and then returned it for a refund. Although it seems quite wasteful, the reason for this was because the licensing agreement Costco has with its suppliers dictates that the producer had to absorb the losses on returns, instead of Costco.

The boycott of Ting-Hsin products and the milk protest resulted in tremendous losses for the company, and its owners, who the public blamed for the food safety scandal. Eventually, the protests were deemed successful as considerable financial damage was done to the corporation and the family who ran it, with some of them having to serve prison sentences.

It’s been more than a decade since the scandal erupted, and while the public is still quite wary about what happened, the Wei Chuan Corporation (味全食品), which separated from Ting Hsin in the aftermath of the scandal, revived the Weichuan Dragons (味全龍) professional baseball team, appealing to the nation’s love of baseball, as an attempt to repair their public image.

Obviously, I’m not here today to dwell on corporate greed, and something that a lot of people don’t actually realize is that ‘Linfengying’ isn't just the name of a brand of milk, it’s also the name of a small village in southern Taiwan, whose residents, mostly hard working farmers, had little to do with the scandal that erupted across the country.

Located within Tainan City’s rural Liujia District (六甲區), Linfengying is a small village where you’re likely to find more cattle than humans, so its probably not of much interest to most tourists, but it’s also a historically significant farming settlement. Dating back to Taiwan’s Kingdom of Tungning (東寧王國) era. It also just so happens to be home to one of the nation’s few remaining Japanese-era wooden train stations, and that nearly century-old train station, which remains in operation today has become one of the village’s most famous attractions.

Today, I’ll be introducing this beautiful little station as part of my ongoing project covering historic Japanese-era stations across the country. However, even though its the kind of place that I’m personally quite interested in, unless you find yourself traveling between Chiayi and Tainan on the train, it’s probably not one of those destinations you’re going to want to go out of your way to visit. If you’re a fan of the railway or Taiwanese history, though, its probably well worth a quick stop during you travels.

Rinhoei Station (林鳳營驛 / りんほうえいえき)

In order to start detailing the history of the train station, I’m going to have to start by helping readers better understand the village where it’s located. Obviously, as mentioned earlier, for the vast majority of people in Taiwan, the name ‘Linfengying’ is automatically associated with one of the nation’s most well-known dairy producers. However, if you ask most people where Linfengying is located, it’s unlikely that many of them would be able to give you a proper answer. One could argue that Geography isn’t a subject that the Taiwanese education system puts much emphasis on, but in this case, you can’t really blame anyone for having no idea where it is.

Located within northern Tainan’s Liujia district (六甲區), the village is geographically closer to Chiayi City than it is Tainan, and the strange thing is that it’s currently just a place name rather than an actual town. According to the government, Linfengying doesn’t have an official designation as a ‘village' or a ‘neighborhood', so if you look at the address for the station listed below, it’s a little confusing.

The longer you live in Taiwan, the more you’ll discover this kind of loophole, when it comes to small communities like this one, is quite common, especially when you travel further south. If you’re a local, you’ll tell people you live in Linfengying, but if you’re the local mailman, you just have to remember who lives where in order to do your job. Interestingly, this was a theme that was explored in the famed ‘Cape No 7’ (海角7號) film directed by Wei Te-sheng (魏德聖). Nevertheless, in Linfengyin’s case, it probably isn’t very difficult for the mailman given that there are more cows living there than there are people.

The next thing we need to clear up with regard to this non-official-village is its name. If you’re familiar with Mandarin, you’re probably aware that the name ‘Linfengying’ (林鳳營) is an odd one when it comes to how places are named in Taiwan. In my article about Chiayi Train Station (嘉義車站), I mentioned how the name ‘Kagi’ was ‘bestowed’ upon the town by the Qing Emperor. Following a similar model, the name of this village originated during Taiwan’s Kingdom of Tungning Era (東寧王國) between 1661 and 1683 when Koxinga (鄭成功) and his army seized control of the island and expelled the Dutch. Upon their arrival, they were faced with an untamed land, and in order to keep their army well-fed, Koxinga spread his various battalions throughout Southern Taiwan, where they set up farming communities. Under instructions from one of the Kingdom’s most important civil administrators, Chen Yonghua (陳永華), new farming techniques were utilized for water-storage, and before long grain harvests became sustainable, allowing the short-lived kingdom to focus on cash crops to make the island economically self-sufficient.

Notably, most of these farming communities outside of the capital of Tainan were named, ‘Erjia’ (二甲), ‘Sanjia’ (三甲), ‘Sijia’ (四甲), ‘Wujia’ (五甲), ’Liujia' (六甲), and so on. If we keep in mind that the word ‘jia’ (甲) is an ancient way of referring to an army or soldiers, the towns were basically named, Second Army, Third Army, Fourth Army, etc.

However, one of the more northern of those farming communities was where General Lin Feng (林鳳), one of Koxinga’s most decorated warriors, garrisoned his troops. General Lin is known for a number of successful exploits, and he was noted not only for his bravery and his strength, but also his ability to prevail in battle when others were unable.

Unfortunately for General Lin, his luck would eventually run out when he was killed in action in 1662. In order to commemorate his service, the area where he set up his camp was officially named ‘Lîm-hōng-iâ’ with the word ‘’ or ‘ying’ (營), which translates as ‘camp' or ‘barracks’ completing tne name, which is literally ‘General Lin Feng’s Camp’ in English, and it has been known that way ever since.

When the Japanese arrived in Taiwan in 1895, the memory of Koxinga, who was mixed Chinese and Japanese was utilized for propaganda purposes, and thus many of the location names that dated back to the Kingdom of Tungning Era were left untouched. The only thing that changed was the pronunciation of the Hokkien name to the Japanese pronunciation, Rinhoei (りんほうえい).

Shortly after taking control of Taiwan, one of the main development objectives for the colonial government was the establishment of a railway that would encircle the island. Planning started shortly after the first Japanese boots stepped foot in Keelung in 1895. Led by a group of western-educated military engineers, who were initially tasked with getting the rudimentary Qing-era railway between Keelung and Taipei back up and running. As the military made its way south in its mission to take complete control of the island, the engineers followed close behind surveying the land for the future railway. By 1902, the team's proposal for the ‘Jukan Tetsudo Project’ (縱貫鐵道 / ゅうかんてつどう), otherwise known as the ‘Taiwan Trunk Railway Project,’ which would have the railroad pass through each of Taiwan’s established settlements, including Kirin (基隆), Taihoku (臺北), Shinchiku (新竹), Taichu (臺中), Tainan (臺南) and Takao (高雄) was finalized and approved by the colonial government.

Link: Taiwan Railway Museum (臺灣總督府鐵道部)

Construction on the railway was split up into three phases with teams of engineers spread out between the ‘northern’, ‘central’ and ‘southern' regions of the island. In just four short years the northern and southern portions of the railway were completed, but due to unforeseen complications, the central area met with delays and construction issues. Nevertheless, the more than four-hundred kilometer western railway was completed in 1908 (明治41), taking just under a decade to complete, a feat in its own right, given all of the obstacles that had to be overcome.

I’ve jumped around quite a bit in the railway construction timeline here, and I’m afraid I may end up confusing people, so I think it’s important to explain that the construction of the southern portion of the railway was completed quite early. In fact, while the government was still mulling over the proposals for the Taiwan Trunk Railway Project, construction on the railway in the south was already almost completed. The southern section, originally between Takao (Kaohsiung) and Tainan opened for service in 1900, and once that section was done, construction continued progressing north towards Kagi (Chiayi).

Interestingly, as construction on the railway progressed, in some cases, instead of constructing stations, the engineers built temporary platforms (臨時乘降場 / かりじょうこうじょう), which marked the space where a train station would eventually be constructed. The focus was to get things up and running before refining the system, which is one of the reasons why construction on the railway was able to be completed so quickly. The Rinhoei Temporary Platform (林鳳營乘降) opened for service in 1901 (明治34年), which would have been a pretty big thing for the village, despite its low population.

The temporary station, though, didn’t end up lasting very long as the First Generation Rinhoei Station (林鳳營停車場) officially opened just a year later in 1902 (明治35年). The small wooden station house that was constructed would remain in place for the next three decades prior to it being renovated and expanded in 1933 (昭和8年). Amazingly, given the number of devastating earthquakes in central Taiwan over the first few decades of the Japanese era, the First Generation station remained standing for four decades. That being said, the 1941 Chungpu Earthquake (中埔地震) ended up being the one that toppled the station, requiring the construction of an entirely new station.

Link: Taiwan’s Remaining Japanese-era Train Stations (台鐵現存日治時期車站)

The Second Generation Rinhoei Station (第二代林鳳營驛), the station we continue to enjoy today, opened for service on March 31st, 1943 (昭和45年). The design of the station was considered quite standard for its time, making use of an architectural design that became common in both Taiwan and Japan at the time. Most notably, the nearby Houbi Station (後壁車站), which also had to be reconstructed due to the earthquake, is almost exactly the same. However, it’s important to note that even though this style of architectural design, which I’ll explain in detail a little later, became the standard for smaller stations like this, when the building was constructed, funding was pretty tight, given that Japan went on an ill-fated militaristic adventure, which would ultimately end in massive defeat.

When the Japanese era came to an end and the Chinese Nationalists took control of Taiwan, the station was renamed ‘Linfungying Station’ (林鳳營車站), which as we should know by now was just the Mandarin pronunciation of the village. What’s important to note about the difference between the Japanese era and the current era is that train stations were originally designated using the Japanese word ‘eki’ (驛 / 駅 / えき) whereas they’re now referred to as ’chezhan’ (車站), which is a minor difference between the two languages.

Suffice to say, the next half century was pretty uneventful at the station, and nothing really changed until 2003, when a more than a decade-long political argument about the method of romanization used in Taiwan started. In 2002, the government adopted the ‘Tongyong Pinyin’ (通用拼音) system, which was considered an improvement on the ‘Hanyu Pinyin’ (漢語拼音) system used in China. The point was the adopt a uniform system of romanization that ended decades of variations of the Wade-Giles (威妥瑪拼音) system of romanization that made little to no sense.

From 2003 to 2009, the station’s signage was changed to ‘Linfongying’, but when the Chinese Nationalist Party won an election landslide in 2008, it was announced that Hanyu Pinyin would become the standard of romanization of Taiwan, and the signage at the station was changed again to ‘Linfengying,’ which makes more sense, at least to me.

What doesn’t make sense is that taxpayers dollars are constantly being wasted on all these romanization policy changes. You might think its not a big deal, but when you take into consideration all the signage between the Taiwan Railway, Taipei Metro, Taiwan High Speed Rail, Kaohsiung Metro, etc, there are close to five hundred public transit stations in Taiwan where money has to be spent to change these things.

Hopefully they’ll just stick with the current system.   

As the railway has continued to modernize over the decades, it’s actually quite amazing that this station hasn’t been phased out, but since the turn of the century, steps have been taken to reduce the amount of funding required to keep it operational. In 2000, the station was reclassified as a Simple Station (簡易站), which meant that it would only be serviced by local commuter trains (區間車), with the various types of express trains passing by. Management of the station was transferred to the staff at the nearby Longtian Station (隆田車站), and later, the station started using electronic card swiping, reducing the need for additional staff at the station.

Today, you’re likely only going to find one or two people working at the station, whose role it is to maintain safety, keep it clean, and ensure that everything runs smoothly.

Save for some chipping paint on the exterior of the building, the station today remains in relatively good shape. At some point, though, its going to have to receive some restoration work to ensure that it can remain in operation for years to come. Fortunately, it was officially recognized as a Protected Heritage Property (保護的歷史性建築) in 2005, which means that funding has to be made available for its eventual restoration. The current station recently celebrated its eightieth anniversary, which is quite a feat in Taiwan today, but its longevity is really thanks to the community that it services.

Before I move on to detailing the architectural design of the station, I’ve put together a condensed timeline of events in the dropdown box below with regard to the station’s history for anyone who is interested:

    • 1895 (明治28年) - The Japanese take control of Taiwan as per the terms of China’s surrender in the Sino-Japanese War.

    • 1896 (明治29年) - The Colonial Government puts a team of engineers in place to plan for a railway network on the newly acquired island.

    • 1900 (明治33年) - The first completed section of the Japanese-era railway opens for service in southern Taiwan between the port town of Kaohsiung and Tainan.

    • 1901 (明治34年) - The Rinhoei Platform (林鳳營乘降) opens for service. Constructed simply as a temporary platform (臨時乘降場 / かりじょうこうじょう) prior to the construction of the station.

    • 1902 (明治35年) - After years of planning and surveying, the government formally approves the Jukan Tetsudo Project (縱貫鐵道 / ゅうかんてつどう), a plan that will connect the western and eastern coasts of the island by rail.

    • 1902 (明治35年) - The First Generation Rinhoei Station (林鳳營停車場) opens for service.

    • 1933 (昭和8年) - The station undergoes a period of restoration and expansion.

    • 1941 (昭和43年) - On December 17th, a massive magnitude 7.1 earthquake (中埔地震) occurs in southern Kagi and among the casualties is the original Rinhoei Station.

    • 1943 (昭和45年) - The Second Generation Rinhoei Station opens for service, with its architectural design exactly the same as nearby Koheki Station (後壁車站).

    • 2000 (民國89年) - The station is downgraded from a third-class station (三等站) to a simple station (簡易站) with its management being taken care of by the staff at nearby Longtian Station (隆田車站). The downgrade in status means that the station is only serviced by local commuter trains (區間車).

    • 2003 (民國92年) - In accordance with the government’s romanization policy, the station’s name is changed from ‘Linfungying’ to ‘Linfongying’ (both of which aren’t standard pinyin).

    • 2005 (民國94年) - Linfengyin Station is recognized as a protected heritage property (保護的歷史性建築)

    • 2013 (民國102年) - The station is optimized to make use of card-swiping machines instead of requiring tickets, which reduces the need for staff at the station.

    • 2016 (民國105年) - The station-front of Linfengying Station receives a complete remodel with the road approaching the station improved, and the bus station that transports the station’s passengers elsewhere is given a complete remodel.

Architectural Design

Rinhoei Station, like quite a few other train stations around Taiwan, especially those in central and southern Taiwan, is what we refer to as a ‘Second Generation’ (第二代) station. As we learned above, the first version of the station lasted almost four decades, but it eventually succumbed to an earthquake in 1941, requiring a complete rebuild. The interesting thing about this is that the original station actually lasted a lot longer than some of its contemporaries, especially those in the region between between Taichung and Tainan, most of which were rebuilt in the 1920s and 1930s.

When those stations were rebuilt, in most cases they were done quite beautifully, and as was the case during the Showa era in Taiwan (1926-1945), most of them were constructed with reinforced concrete and made use of a fusion style of architectural design that combined traditional Japanese design with elements of western design. A pretty good example of this is the Second Generation Tai’an Railway Station (泰安舊車站) in Taichung, which was reconstructed in 1937.

There are a few reasons why I mention this: The first is because when the Japanese first arrived in Taiwan, resources were scarce, and when it came to construction projects, most of the materials had to be imported directly from Japan. Thanks to the rapid development of the island, however, those materials were eventually able to be made locally, which made construction projects progress considerably faster, and the cost was considerably less.

That being said, the rebuild of Rinhoei Station came at a time when the Japanese government was strapped for cash, and the funds that would typically reserved for a construction project like this just weren’t available due to the Japanese empire’s ill-advised military adventures.

Ultimately, this station just wasn’t busy enough to necessitate one of the more costly styles of building, like the one mentioned above, but as far as I’m concerned, that’s okay. I think a small wooden station in a quiet southern Taiwanese village gives off a much much hometown kind of vibe.

When it comes to these traditional wooden station houses, by the time this one was constructed, it’s safe to say that it probably didn't take much effort in the architectural-design process. The construction staff at the Railway Bureau were already quite proficient in building them, and stations constructed in this particular design had become quite common rural areas in both Japan and Taiwan.

As mentioned earlier, though, when both Rinhoei Station and neighboring Koheki Station (後壁驛), known today as ‘Houbi Station’ were constructed, funds were tight. With that in mind, the amount of extra care that was usually taken for these buildings wasn’t available. To make a comparison, if you take a look at the more more traditional Qidu Train Station (舊七堵車站) just outside of Keelung, you’re likely able to see a very obvious difference in the attention to detail that was taken with regard to the woodwork, the windows, the roof, and the pillars that surround the building allowing for the extension of a more traditional-style roof.

To describe the station’s architecture, let’s start with the basics: Rinhoei Station was designed using elements of Western Baroque (巴洛克建築) combined with traditional Japanese design. However, for cost-saving measures, the western elements were subdued, making the Japanese elements stand out more. The station was constructed using irimoya-zukuri (入母屋造 / いりもやづくり) style of design, most often referred to in English as the “East Asian hip-and-gable roof,” which is a translation that I have issues with.

What ‘irimoya’ actually means is that the building was constructed in a method that ensures that the building is structurally sound enough to be able to withstand the weight of a roof, which usually eclipses the size of the base. This style of design is set up to support a number of traditional Japanese-style roofs, some of which can be quite elaborate, while others, like this one are quite plain. In order to support the roof, which is usually covered with heavy tiles, the base is equipped with pillars on both the interior and exterior and are connected to a network of trusses, which allow the building to not only sustain the weight of the roof, but offer stabilization during earthquakes.

The roof was constructed using the four-sided ‘yosemune’ style (寄棟造 / よせむねづくり) of design, which is one of Japan’s more simplistic styles of architectural design, and somewhat comparable to the four-sided roofs we’re used to in western countries. With four sloping faces and two trapezoid-shaped ends. The tiles that cover the roof were replaced at some point, and although they’re still stone tiles, the original tile ends, known in Japanese as ‘onigawara’ (鬼瓦 / おにがわら) were replaced with tiles that have the words ‘fortune’ (福) on them. 

When you look at the roof of this building, you’ll probably notice a pretty big difference from the other Japanese-era buildings that remain around Taiwan, because it’s about as basic as you’ll get with the architectural design of that era. It’s not particularly that impressive, but its functional, which is the most important thing, right?

Despite the simplicity of the roof’s design, like every building constructed in the irimoya-style, it eclipses the base of the building, offering protection from the elements for anyone waiting outside the station for friends and family to arrive. To assist with the stabilization, there is a series of pillars outside of the passenger-side of the building that surround the station on three sides. In the past, passengers would have been able to exit the station without actually passing through the turnstiles, but since the introduction of the e-card swiping system, that has been changed.

What hasn’t changed, though, is the extension of the roof that covers the eastern-side of the building is quite large, with a side exit that provides access to the station’s waiting room.

Once again, to make a comparison, with regard to the cost-saving measures when it came to the construction of this building, if we take a look at Bao-an Station (保安車站), south of Tainan Station, you’ll discover that there is an absence of the traditionally designed roof-covered ‘kurumayose' (車寄/くるまよせ) porch that protrudes from the flat front of the building. There’s a porch here, but it’s about as basic as you’re going to get from Japanese-era architectural design, although when paired with the roof, one of those flashy porches probably wouldn’t really mix well anyway.

Moving onto the interior, the base of the building is essentially a rectangular-shaped structure that is split into two sections, with the larger eastern side reserved for passengers, and the smaller western side used by the staff working at the station. Obviously given that the station remains in operation, there’s not much I can say about the interior of the staff section of the station as its not accessible to the public. The eastern-side of the building that’s reserved for passengers, however, is interesting, as it’s cleverly split into two sections.

From the entrance, you’ll enter the main lobby of the building where the turnstiles to the platform are directly in front of you. The ticket window and the private section of the station is directly to your left while there’s waiting lobby to the right. The passenger side is considerably larger, and features beautiful wooden benches and features beautiful Japanese-style paneled sliding glass windows (日式橫拉窗) on all four sides, which assist in providing a considerable amount of Tainan’s natural light into the interior as well as a bit of breeze on hot days. There’s also an alternate exit within the waiting lobby that previously allowed people to exit through a different set of turnstiles, but currently offers faster access to a recently constructed detached public washroom space a short distance from the building.

Within the interior of the building, there’s not all that much that you need to pay attention to, but I’d like to point out three things that some people might not realize the significance of. The first is the small wooden gate located near the ticket booth. Gates like this were once very common in train stations during the Japanese-era as a means to help filter people in and out while waiting in line, but, sadly, very few of them remain these days. The gate was originally constructed to look like the Japanese word for ‘money’ (円), but was likely replaced at some point and looks a little different now.

The second thing you’ll want to take note of is probably a little more obvious, and already mentioned above, but it’s important to note that the long wooden benches in the waiting room are originals, and even though they’ve been poorly painted over a few times, they’re quite nice, and like the wooden gate, are part of a dying breed in Taiwan’s train stations.

Once you’ve passed through the turnstiles to the platform space, you can get a pretty good look at the rear of the station, especially the roof as you climb the stairs to the overpass that brings you to the railway platform. As the railway has widened and been electrified in the decades since the station was constructed, this entire area has transformed considerably. What hasn’t changed, though, is that while you’re waiting for your train to arrive and take you away, you get to enjoy one last look at this historic station.

Getting There

 

Address: Linfengying #16, Liujia District, Tainan (臺南市六甲區林鳳營16號)

GPS: 23.238889, 120.320556

Whenever I write about one of Taiwan’s historic train stations, obviously the best advice for getting there is to simply take the train, and in this case, I really don’t think there’s any better option. The thing about Linfengying is that it’s pretty much in the middle of nowhere, in an awkward position just south of Chiayi Station, and several stops north of Tainan Station.

If you have your own means of transportation, you can simply input the address listed above into your vehicle’s GPS, or on Google Maps to get to the station. There’s a parking lot to the left of the main entrance of the station, so you’ll be able to park your car or scooter for a short time to go check it out.

There’s also a Youbike Station at the station with about two dozen bikes available, so if you feel like exploring the area by bicycle, you can hop on a bike and go for a ride through the village, which is mostly just farmland.

Bus

Just outside of the station, there’s a bus station that is serviced by a number of bus routes. Most of the routes head in the direction of Xinying (新營), Liujia (六甲) or Madou (麻豆), and are set up more for the local citizens than they are for tourists, so I’m not sure how much help they’ll be for the average visitor.

Trust me, you’re much better off taking the train.

Whether you look at this station with a 120 year history, or as an eighty-year old building, it’s quite remarkable that it has been able to withstand the test of time, and the constant modernization efforts made by the Taiwan Railway.

There aren’t many stations like this remaining in operation today, so if you find yourself passing through the area, you might want to stop by and check it out. It’s a part of Taiwan’s living history, and even though it’s not a major tourist attraction, it does deserve a bit of appreciation and attention.

References

  1. Linfengying railway station | 林鳳營車站 中文 | 林鳳営駅 日文 (Wiki)

  2. 曾文郡 | 六甲庄 | 林鳳營

  3. Tainan Prefecture | 臺南州 中文台南州 日文 (Wiki)

  4. 林鳳營車站 (國家文化記憶庫)

  5. 林鳳營車站 (國家文化資產庫)

  6. 林鳳營車站 (臺灣驛站之旅)

  7. 台南林鳳營的春夏秋冬 探訪車站旁樹屋與莫內花園,等待落羽松秘境秋紅轉黃 (微笑台灣)

  8. 林鳳營車站‧用心生活品出的濃醇香 (旅行途中)


Bao'an Station (保安車站)

I’m a bit of a weirdo when it comes to organization, so when it comes to places that I want to visit, I have a map that I’m constantly updating, and, as I’ve mentioned on numerous occasions, the majority of spots that I have on my list are located somewhere in the south of Taiwan. Over the years, I’ve added so many places to visit on the map that I’d probably need months to visit all of them, but all that means is that whenever I do find the time to make my way down south, I always have a tight schedule of things to see and do with the little time that I have.

That being said, when I do find the time, my plans often end up being far too ambitious, and although I always try my best to get a lot of work done, something I’ve come to realize is that the pace of life down there is a lot more chill than it is up here in the north. Instead of running around trying to visit as many places as possible, a better idea might be to, instead, visit a few destinations while also remembering to spend time relaxing, enjoying the weather, eating great food, and enjoying some really cool coffee shops.

These decisions are, admittedly, made a lot easier when your trip is interrupted by a tropical storm that brings with it days of torrential rain. so, with few other options with such weather, a lot of the time during my most recent trip south was spent hanging out in some of the Tainan’s hip coffeeshops, where I enjoyed the tropical fruit-inspired coffee that the city has become known for. When the weather did clear up, I set off to check out some places on my list, but when the rain came back, I was off again in search of another seat at a coffee shop.

Even though I wasn’t as productive on this trip as I have been on others, I made the most of my time, despite the weather, and got to see a few places that I had on my list. Without a hint of irony, though, on the day that I was scheduled to head home, I woke up for breakfast, packed my bags, checked out of my hotel, and walked out into the kind of beautiful weather that Tainan is known for. With a few hours before my train was scheduled to depart, I decided to make the most of the little time I had and made my way to the historic Bao-An Station (保安車站), one of the locations that was pretty high up on my list.

If you’ve been following my blog for any period of time, you’re probably well-aware that one of my ongoing projects has been documenting Taiwan’s historic railway stations, especially those that date back to the Japanese-era, so this was one of the places on my list that I was really looking forward to visiting, and fortunately, I was able to check it out as it was on my way to the High Speed Rail Station that would eventually take me home.

View of the station from the train

Hopping on the train at Tainan Station and heading south on the commuter train, I couldn’t help but feel like I was back in Japan riding through the countryside. The scenery outside of the train, the bright natural light inside the carriage, and only the sound of the train seemed very Japan-like, but that’s probably because I’m more familiar with the trains up here in north where people are always chatting, playing on their phones and watching noisy videos. When the train stopped at Bao-an Station and I got off, that feeling of being in Japan became even stronger, because just across the platform was the small wooden station, which is architecturally identical to many of the older stations you’ll see in the countryside of Japan.

Amazingly, despite being one of the oldest of Taiwan’s remaining wooden train stations, and the amount of traffic that passes through on a daily basis, Bao-an Station remains in pretty good shape. Over the past century, a lot has changed in Taiwan, and the railway itself has been in a constant flux of modernization, but Bao-an Station has stayed the same, which I suppose you could say is credit to the architectural design that has allowed it to remain standing for so long. However, as an actively used heritage building, at some point it’s probably going to have to get a little love in the form of restoration in order to ensure that we’re able to enjoy it for many years to come.

As I usually do with these articles, I’ll start by introducing the history of the train station, its architectural design, and then give readers information about how to visit if they’re interested in checking out this little piece of Taiwanese history.   

Shiyaroken Station (車路墘驛 / しやろけんえき)

To start, I suppose I should talk about the name of the station, because, you might be a little confused with the discrepancy between with the title of the article and the name of the station provided above. Admittedly, this is something that I was quite confused about myself as well until I dug into my research process for this article.

Suffice to say, the name of the station was changed to ‘Bao-an’ (保安) in the 1960s, nearly two decades after the end of the Japanese-era. For the six decades prior, the station was named ‘Shiyaroken' Station in Japanese, which came from the Taiwanese word “Tshia-loo-kinn” (車路墘). The interesting thing about this specific name, and the reason why I was confused, is that there were several areas in Taiwan in the early years of the Japanese-era with this name, but the Chinese character ‘qian’ (墘) is an older word that is rarely used these days in Mandarin, and pretty much non-existent in Japanese.

In addition to Tainan, you could also find places named ‘Tshia-loo-kinn’ in both Taichung and Pingtung as well, and in each case, the names date back to the Qing Dynasty, and (although I haven’t found any credible source regarding the origin of the name) likely referred to ‘road-side stops’ that were once located along the safe trading routes of the time.

To better understand the name, I’ll break it down for you:

  1. 車 (Tshia) - vehicle; car;

  2. 路 (loo) - road; path;

  3. 墘 (kinn) - Taiwanese word for ‘beside’ (旁邊) or ‘nearby’ (附近)

Take from that what you will - The important thing is that after the arrival of the Japanese, the name stayed the same, but it was pronounced “Shiyaroken” (しやろけんえき / シヤロケンエキ) in Japanese, which is actually quite similar to the Taiwanese pronunciation.

Staying on the subject of the station’s name, when it was changed from ‘Shiyaroken’ (or Tshia-loo-kinn) to ‘Bao’an’ in the 1960s, the reason for doing so, if you’re asking me, was a little strange. The official reason for the name change isn’t well-documented, but they changed it to ‘Bao’an’ in honor of the local Bao’an Temple (車路墘保安宮). The reason why I’d argue that this was a bit odd was because the temple wasn't actually all that close to the station, and was in fact much closer to Rende Station (仁德車站), the next stop south. It’s possible that they just changed the name to something that was easier for the ‘newer’ residents of Taiwan, who had trouble speaking Taiwanese, or possibly because the ticket-making system that was used at the time wasn’t actually compatible with the characters.

If you read my article about Taichung’s Zhuifen Train Station (追分車站), the original name of the station in Japanese was ‘Oiwake Railway Station’ (追分驛 / おいわけえき), but given that the Chinese characters for “Oiwake” (追分) are an abbreviation for a much more auspicious meaning in Mandarin, which translates as “chasing your dreams” or “pursuing your destiny” (追到緣分), they made a similar name change to another station nearby. In that case, the next station over, originally named ‘Oda Station’ (王田驛) was officially renamed ‘Chenggong Station’ (成功車站) in the 1960s. This became a hit with the locals, who collected tickets with the stations ‘Zhuifen - Chenggong’ (追分 - 成功) as together the stations translate almost literally as “make your dreams come true” (zhui fen cheng gong / 追分成功).

Given the time frame of that particular name change, I figured the distance from the temple ultimately didn’t really make much of a difference to the Taiwan Rail Corporation at the time because a ticket from the newly re-named ‘Bao’an Station’ (保安車站) to the nearby ‘Yongkang Station’ (永康車站) became an instant hit with locals. The reason for this was similar to the situation above as the tickets employed a homophonic pun in Mandarin that read in a clockwise manner became ‘Yongbao Ankang’ (永保安康), or literally, ‘Peace and health forever!’

Even though my article about Zhuifen Station predates this one, it was only until I started my research for my article did I realize that the ‘auspicious ticket’ thing was initiated at Bao’an Station. I had always assumed it was a result of the name change between Zhuifen and Chenggong.

This is why I enjoy doing all this research for these articles. I learn a lot in the process!

Link: Auspicious train ticket | 吉祥語車票 (Wiki)

With regard to the history of this station, it actually got its start quite early. As I mentioned before in my article about Taiwan’s Remaining Japanese-era Train Stations (台鐵現存日治時期車站), the Jukan Tetsudo Project (ゅうかんてつどう / 縱貫鐵道), known in English as the ‘Taiwan Trunk Railway Project,’ quickly got underway shortly after the Japanese took control of Taiwan. The project, which sought to have a railway constructed from Keelung in the north and Kaohsiung in the south (and beyond), was constructed in different phases, and the southern phase that connected Tainan to Takao (Kaohsiung) was completed quite early.

Amazingly, it would take just over a decade to have the entire west coast railway completed, but by the time the entire system was connected, Shiyaroken Station had already been in operation for about eight years on the southern stretch of the railway between Tainan and the port station in Kaohsiung.

When most people introduce the history of the station, resources will point to a specific date to when it was established, but I have to note that there is a bit of a caveat to those claims - Originally opening for service on November 29th, 1900 (明治33年) as ‘Shiyaroken Parking Lot’ (車路墘停車場), it would only be upgraded into a ‘station’ (驛) a few years later after the opening of the Shiyaroken Sugar Factory (車路墘製糖所), which was located a short distance away from the station. That being said, when the Sugar Factory opened, the station was moved about 1.5 kilometers north of its original location for the benefit of the staff at the factory, officially opening on November 10th, 1909 (明治42年).

Oh, and remember when I mentioned above that the local Bao’an Temple was much closer to Rende Station? Well, that station, which opened in 2014, sits on the same location as the original Shiyaroken Station.

Note: That ‘Parking Lot’ reference above was a very literal translation - Today, the word most commonly used in Mandarin for ‘parking lot’ is ‘停車場’, which is literally: ’Stop Car Space’, but a long time ago in Japanese, the same characters were used to identify a minor train station. The term, ‘Teishajo’ (停車場 / ていしゃじょう) was a designation that was mostly used for smaller train stations, as opposed to the larger stations, known in Japanese as ‘eki’ ( / えき), which is another word that isn’t used in Mandarin.

Although Bao-an Station opened in its current location in 1909, another aspect of the station’s history that isn’t so well-advertised is that it likely wasn’t upgraded into an ‘eki’ (驛 / えき) type of station until 1928 (昭和3年), when the currently used station house was constructed. So, if we’re being strict with these things, the station might have been established well-over a century ago, but the building that we can pass through today is just a few years short of a century old.

Interestingly, though, the history of this station is one that goes in spurts where there’s a flurry of activity, and then some downtime when not much happens for a few years, which then repeats itself. The little station has pretty much remained the same for over a century, but the world around it has changed considerably, and the number of people passing through its turnstiles have been reflected by these changes. Obviously, the number of people passing though the station was consistent while the nearby Sugar Factory was in operation between 1909 (明治42年) and 2003 (民國92年) as the station was only a stop away from the downtown core of Tainan.

Link: Ten Drum Rende Creative Park (Wiki) | Ten Drum Tainan (Taiwan Everything)

In 2001, though, daily traffic at the station increased by about 500% due to the popularity of the 'Yongkang - Bao-an’ auspicious ticket. By the time that craze settled down, though, the number of passengers started to decrease due to fewer trains stopping at the station. Most recently, thanks to the construction of the High Speed Rail Station and the new Shalun Branch Line (沙崙線), the number of arrivals at the station has once again started to increase, and this was helped out even more by the opening of the beautiful Chimei Museum, which is within walking distance of the station.

During my visit to the station, on a beautiful sunny Monday morning, it was quite busy with a number of passengers coming and going as well as a number of tourists who had come to check out the station prior to walking over to the Chimei Museum (奇美博物館).

Roof damage on the lower right side.

With all of the tourist traffic passing through the station, it remains relatively attractive, and nostalgic for a lot of people, but looking at it through my telephoto lens, its obvious that it is in need of some urgent reparations and restoration. Sections of the roof have begun to sink in, and the city government has cited termite damage on the wooden exterior.

As a Protected Heritage Property, eventually they’ll have to restore the building, but unlike many of Taiwan’s other older railway stations, its highly unlikely that it's in any danger of being torn down or replaced any time soon.

In the drop-down box below, I’ll offer a concise timeline of the stations history and then I’ll introduce its architectural design:

    • 1896 (明治29年) - The Colonial Government puts a team of engineers in place to plan for a railway network on the newly acquired island.

    • 1900 (明治33年) - Shiyaroken Station (車路墘停車場) opens for service on a limited track running between Tainan Station (臺南停車場) and Takao Port Station (打狗停車場).

    • 1902 (明治35年) - After years of planning and surveying, the government formally approves the Jukan Tetsudo Project (縱貫鐵道 / ゅうかんてつどう), a railway plan to be constructed along the western and eastern coasts of the island.

    • 1908 (明治41年) - The 400 kilometer Taiwan Western Line (西部幹線) is completed with a ceremony held within Taichung Park (台中公園) on October 24th. For the first time, the major settlements along the western coast of the island are connected by rail from Kirin (Keelung 基隆) to Takao (Kaohsiung 高雄).

    • 1909 (明治42年) - Shiyaroken Station is relocated 1.5 kilometers north of its original location for the benefit of staff of the newly established Shiyaroken Sugar Factory (車路墘製糖所).

    • 1920 (大正9年) - In a major administrative restructuring policy, Tainan Prefecture (臺南州) is officially established, stretching from Chiayi to just south of Bao-an Station.

    • 1928 (昭和3年) - The current station house, constructed entirely of cypress from Alishan (阿里山) is completed and opens for service.

    • 1945 (昭和20年) - The Second World War comes to an end and the Japanese surrender control of Taiwan to the Chinese Nationalists.

    • 1962 (民國51年) - Shiyaroken Station is officially renamed ‘Bao’an Station’ (保安車站).

    • 2001 (民國90年) - Bao’an Station is recognized as a Tainan City Heritage Building (臺南市市定古蹟)

    • 2001 (民國90年) - Bao’an Station experiences a massive surge in traffic due to the popularity of the Yongkang - Bao’an tickets. Daily ridership increases by at least 500% for the year.

    • 2008 (民國97年) - A second platform is constructed at Bao’an Station, creating the first expansion.

    • 2011 (民國100年) - The Shalun Branch Line (沙崙線) running from Tainan Station to Shalun Station, next to the Tainan High Speed Rail Station opens for service. The number of commuter trains departing Tainan Station is increased, which means that the number of daily departures and arrivals at Bao’an Station increases.

    • 2014 (民國103年) - In order to prepare for the construction of the future Tainan City subway system, the Taiwan Railway Corporation established Rende Station (仁德車站), about 1.5 kilometers south of Bao’an Station on the site of the Shiyaroken Station that was established in 1900.

    • 2015 (民國104年) - The Chimei Museum (奇美博物館) opens in new location within walking distance of the station, which creates an increased amount of daily traffic.

Architectural Design

Whenever it’s time to start detailing the architectural design specifics of the historic Japanese-era buildings that I write about, it’s often where I end up spending the majority of my time researching and writing, but, fortunately, in this case, I won’t need that much time. I’ve already written a number of articles about Taiwan’s historic train stations, each of which was constructed in an almost identical architectural design. If you’ve read any of my articles about the Coastal Five Treasures (海線五寶), Xiangshan Station (香山車站) or  Qidu Station (七堵車站), you’re likely to notice that most of these stations all appear relatively similar,, save for some minor differences.

The reason for this uniform style of design is because during the late Taisho (大正) and early Showa (昭和) eras, prior to the Second World War, many of the (smaller) train stations constructed in not only Taiwan, but Japan as well, were built in what would become a generic style of station design that offered all the functionality that a train station of the era required, were earthquake proofed in design, and most importantly were cost-effective.

Even though the number of stations constructed in this design have deceased in the post-war era, its rarely ever due to the quality of their design, but the changing demographics of the community that they serve. So, even though you can still find quite a few of these stations around Taiwan and Japan, it’s mostly because they have been constructed in areas where the population hasn’t changed much, and a larger station has yet to become necessary.

Considered to be an architectural fusion of a traditional Japanese-style building with western elements, what I personally find surprising about the design of these stations is that there doesn’t seem to be a specific term in the Japanese language used to describe it. Something I’ve had to learn the hard way during my time researching these things, though, is that it is often difficult to come across these specifics from Japanese sources. In the Chinese language, however, the design of these stations is referred to literally as a ‘Hiraya Kirizuma Western Style Wooden Station House” (木造平家切妻洋小屋), which probably doesn’t tell you much, but does offer a pretty good idea of what to expect from the design of the station if you’re familiar with the terms.

To help you better understand, what it basically means is that these buildings are a ‘single-story’ (平家) station ‘constructed of wood’ (木造), which makes use of the traditional Japanese ‘kirizuma’ style (切妻) of architectural design with 'western fusion elements’ (洋小屋) mixed in. That being said, the ‘western’ aspects of the architectural design were, for the most part, inspired by the architectural design of Western Baroque (巴洛克建築), which was quite popular with the Japanese architects of the day. However, for cost-saving measures, the western elements of design were minimal, and Bao’an Station in particular featured far fewer of these western-inspired elements than its contemporaries.

Like the other stations mentioned earlier, Bao’an Station was constructed using the traditional irimoya-zukuri (入母屋造 / いりもやづくり) style, an ubiquitous style of Japanese design that is most often referred to in English as the “East Asian hip-and-gable roof,” which is a term that I don’t really think gives people a good indication about what’s actually going on with this style of design. The key thing to keep in mind about the ‘irimoya’ style is that despite the English translation, it doesn’t necessarily tell you what ‘variation’ of roof is constructed on any given building, but it does indicate that buildings constructed in this style will feature one of traditional Japanese architecture’s various styles of intricate roof design.

I probably couldn’t come up with a more appropriate English term for describe these buildings, but, for me, a name that focuses more on the ‘moya’ (母屋 / もや) aspect of “irimoya”, might offer people a better idea of what’s going on. In layman’s terms, the ‘moya’ is essentially the core, or the ‘base' of the building, and when the irimoya-style is used, the ‘moya’, (literally the “mother-house”) is usually considerably smaller than the roof, which extends well-beyond the base.

This is a style of design that is also used in much more decorative buildings, such as Shinto Shrines, Buddhist Temples, and Martial Arts Halls, but is also commonly used for anything from houses to train stations like this one. The purpose of the building, and the amount of decorative elements aren’t really all that important, what always remains the same is that as the roof eclipses the size of the base and that the building features a genius network of roof trusses and pillars both within the interior and on the exterior of the building that allow the roof to become the defining aspect of the building, as well as ensuring that its weight is evenly distributed to ensure that the whole thing doesn’t collapse.

In this case, the roof of the station was designed using the kirizuma-zukuri (妻造的樣式) style, which is one of the oldest and most commonly used roof designs in Japan. Translated simply as a “cut-out gable” roof, the kirizuma-style is regarded as one of the more ‘basic’ styles of Japan’s ‘hip-and-gable’ roof designs. To explain as briefly as I can, it is a two-sided roof that can appear simple in design from the front of the building, but as you walk around the perimeter, you’ll notice that it becomes much more complex. The roof is layered with the eaves on the lowest layer extending well beyond the base, supported by a network of pillars that surround it on three sides. The top layer is where you’ll find the ”cut-out gable” with the gable-section of the roof covering the eastern side of the building, while the longer ‘hipped' side ‘cuts’ through it. Both of the ends of the ‘hip’ section feature triangular-shaped “tsuma” (妻 / つま) or gable-ends, with rectangular windows placed in the middle that allow natural light into the interior of the building. 

The upper part of the roof is covered with Japanese-style black tiles (日式黑瓦) while the lower eaves are covered with rain-boards (雨淋板) that help to direct the flow of rain water on rainy days. The black tiles that cover the roof appear to be quite old, and some of them are in pretty bad shape.

I haven’t been able to find any information regarding their age, but its possible that they could be the original tiles from the Japanese-era given that they tend to have a pretty long shelf life. They’re likely going to have to be replaced at some point in the near future, though. The original rain-boards, though, have already been replaced, and if their replacements are any indication, it might be better if those black tiles can last a little longer.

Even though the roof is somewhat basic in terms of its decorative elements, especially when compared to the hip-and-gable style roofs you’ll find on other Japanese-era buildings, there are still a number of elements to take note of, I’ll list each of those specific elements below with a diagram that should help you better understand what’s going on.

  1. Hiragawara (平瓦 /ひらがわら) - A type of arc-shaped clay roofing tile.

  2. Munagawara (棟瓦 /むねがわら) - Ridge tiles used to cover the apex of the roof.

  3. Onigawara (鬼瓦/おにがわら) - Decorative roof tiles found at the ends of a main ridge.

  4. Nokigawara (軒瓦/のきがわら) - The roof tiles placed along the eaves lines.

  5. Noshigawara (熨斗瓦/のしがわら) - Thick rectangular tiles located under ridge tiles.

  6. Sodegawara (袖瓦/そでがわら) - Cylindrical sleeve tiles.

  7. Tsuma (妻/つま) - The triangular shaped parts of the gable on the roof under the ridge.

  8. Hafu (破風板/ はふいた) - Bargeboards that lay flat against the ridge ends to finish the gable.

Moving on from the roof, starting from the main entrance to the station, you’ll find a roof-covered ‘kurumayose' (車寄/くるまよせ) porch that protrudes from the flat front of the building with a pair of pillars holding it up. The roof of the porch features a similarly designed kirizuma-style roof facing in the opposite direction of the roof above, adding to the three dimensional design of the building.

The ‘moya’ base of the building is a cube-like structure that is split into two sections, with one side reserved for passengers, and the other for the staff working at the station. One of the major differences between this station and some of the others mentioned earlier is that the passenger side is considerably larger, and features beautiful wooden benches. When you walk into the building from the front entrance, you are met with the ticket booth on the left while the right-hand side is covered on all three sides with beautiful Japanese-style paneled sliding glass windows (日式橫拉窗), which assist in providing a considerable amount of Tainan’s natural light into the interior as well as a bit of breeze on hot days.

One of the most notable aspects of the interior is the wooden gate located near the ticket booth. Gates like this were once very common in train stations during the Japanese-era as a means to help filter people in and out while waiting in line, but few of them remain these days. The gate was originally constructed to look like the Japanese word for ‘money’ (円), but was likely replaced at some point and looks a little different now.

Similarly, the entrance to the train platform features two wooden partitions that connect to a fence at the rear of the station, which date back to the Japanese-era. Now that the station has transitioned to electronic card swiping, the original turnstiles have been removed, so you can simply just walk through to get to your train.

This is the part of the station’s architectural design that I appreciate the most as the open gates transition into a fence-like structure that includes a roof-covered portico that surrounds the building on three sides. Part of an intricate network of carpentry genius, the pillars that connect to the fence assist in distributing the weight of the roof, but they also prevent people from jumping over the fence to take a free train ride. The fence, pillars, and gates combine to make an almost three-dimensional design and add complex geometric shapes to the design of the building, and are part of the western-inspired elements mentioned above.

In the past, in order to get to the train platform, you literally had to cross the train tracks and walk up a set of stairs that brought you to the island platform. Given how dangerous this is, especially since the introduction of Taiwan’s express trains that speed through without stopping at the station, an overpass has been constructed that allows passengers to safely make their way to the platform area. As I mentioned earlier, the platform area is one of the areas that has been expanded several times since the Japanese-era, which has allowed the station to keep up with the modern changes to the railway, while maintaining the same historic station house. When passengers are waiting for the train on the platform, you can enjoy a pretty good view of the rear of the station, the roof of the building, and the trees that were planted next to the building when it was originally constructed.

Finally, while not exactly part of the architectural design, I’ll conclude by mentioning the trees. One of the things that I’ve really started to appreciate about Japanese architecture, especially when it comes to the construction of buildings, is that they always plant trees next to the building as a time capsule of sorts that helps to show how old the building is. In this case, we have what has become known as the ‘Bao’an Three Treasures’ (保安三寶), which are likened to 'The Three Star’ deities (三星 / 福祿壽), Fu (福), Lu (祿), and Shou (壽), who are often found adorning the top of Taiwan’s temples. To the right of the main entrance, you’ll find an Orange Jasmine (七里香) while the much taller Palm tree (棕櫚樹) and Coastal she-oak (木麻黃) are to the left. If the memorial plaque next to trees is any indication, they date back to 1909 (明治42年) and predate the current station house, which is pretty cool.

Getting There

 

Address: #10, Alley 529, Wenxian Road, Rende District, Tainan City

(臺南市仁德區保安里文賢路一段529巷10號)

GPS: 22.932940, 120.231660

How is one to get to Bao’an Train Station?

You take the train, of course.

Given all the modernization that has taken place on Taiwan’s railway, the fact that you can still take a train to one of the nation’s oldest stations is pretty cool.

So you should definitely take the train. You do however have other options for getting there. 

The station is located only one stop south of Tainan Train Station, and the ride take only about seven minutes to get there. So, if you find yourself the proximity of the downtown core of Tainan, you shouldn’t have much of a problem hopping on a train. Likewise, if you’ve travelled into the city by High Speed Rail, you can transfer to a commuter train from the Shalun Train Station (沙崙車站) and take the train to Bao’an Station, which is a seventeen minute ride.

As a smaller station though, Bao’an Station isn’t serviced by every train headed south rom Tainan, so if you want to visit, you’ll need to make sure that you get on one of the silver Local Commuter Trains (區間車). 

Bus

In terms of buses, there are a few options that’ll help you get to the station, or the Chimei Museum (奇美博物館), which is within walking distance of the station. Located a short distance from the main entrance of the station, you’ll find a roof-covered pavilion set up where buses will come in off the main road and pick people up and drop them off. There are options that will take you to downtown Tainan, as well as others that will take you to the High Speed Rail Station, and beyond.

The following bus routes are available at the Bao’an Station stop:

Tainan City Bus (幹支線公車): Red Line #3, Red Line #4

High Speed Rail Shuttle Bus (高鐵快捷公車): #H31

Kaohsiung Bus (高雄客運): #239, #8042, #8046

I’ve linked to each of the bus routes above, but Taiwanese websites like this are notoriously unreliable, so if you click on any of the links and they don’t work, you should be able to just search the bus route on your own, and you’ll be able to find the link that they’re currently using.

Youbike

The bus stop is also home to a large Youbike Station where you can swipe your EasyCard and hop on one of the shared bicycles. If you’ve taken a Youbike on the ride from Tainan, you can easily dock the bicycle at the docking station in front of the train station and check out the train station, or take the train back to the city.

If you haven’t already, I highly recommend downloading the Youbike App to your phone so that you’ll have a better idea of the location where you’ll be able to find the closest docking station.

Link: Youbike - Apple / Android

Whether you’re simply on your way to the much larger, and (probably) much more interesting Chimei Museum nearby, a stop by this historic train station is an added bonus to your excursion out of Tainan. There aren’t too many stations like this left in Taiwan, and the fact that it still looks so great after nearly one hundred years is a testament to the skills of the carpenters and architects of the era. If you're just getting off the train to before heading else, make sure to take a few minutes to enjoy the historic station, and don’t forget to take a few photos at the same time.

References

  1. Bao'an Railway Station | 保安車站 中文 | 保安駅 日文 (Wiki)

  2. 保安車站 (國家文化資產網)

  3. 保安車站 (國家文化記憶庫)

  4. 保安車站 (鐵貓)

  5. 保安車站 (臺灣驛站之旅)

  6. 保安車站 (Blair and Kate's 旅遊與美食)

  7. 臺南市文化資產 (Wiki)

  8. 112 年度臺南市文資防護專業服務中心成果報告書 (臺南市文化資產管理處)

  9. 臺灣鐵道旅行案內 (臺灣總督府交通局鐵道部)

  10. 台南縱貫線木造車站巡禮 - 保安車站、林鳳營車站、後壁車站 (LINE Today)

  11. 仁德糖廠 (Wiki)

  12. 木造車站-海線五寶 (張誌恩 / 許正諱)


Gallery / Flickr (High Res Photos)