English Friendly! Pingtung Public Transportation Bilingual Easy Go Achieves Great Results: A Leap in Bilingual Services
Published Date: 2025-10-13 06:13:15
Published by: Pingtung County
Department:
Original Link: https://www.pthg.gov.tw/News_Content.aspx?n=528607F80E455D7F&s=C374AD0FC4EEE7F3
In response to the resurgence of international tourists visiting Taiwan in recent years, the Pingtung County Government, in collaboration with the National Development Council, is actively promoting the "2025 Pingtung Public Transportation Bilingual Easy Go" project. By developing bilingual tools for key transportation hubs and tourist service centers, and enhancing the bilingual skills of frontline staff, the project aims to create a more friendly and convenient foreign-language tourism environment. This initiative seeks to eliminate language barriers for travelers exploring Pingtung and inject new momentum into the sustainable tourism development of Pingtung County.
This project focuses on 12 key public transportation and tourist service stations within the county, including the seven major transit stations and tourist information centers in Pingtung City, Chaozhou, Donggang, Hengchun, Fangliao, Shuimen, and Haikou Port. Through on-site needs assessments, tailored bilingual support tools are being developed to meet the specific requirements of the staff. These tools include a "Q&A Category Question Set" handbook and a "Pingtung Tourist Guide" card, both featuring Chinese-English bilingual translations. These resources enable frontline staff to promptly address various travel and transportation inquiries from foreign tourists, such as "Where can I top up my electronic ticket?" and "How do I take the bus to Kenting?". Additionally, bilingual hand-held signs and surrounding guide maps are provided to effectively reduce language barriers. Through localized design and production, the project comprehensively enhances the practical convenience of communicating with foreign tourists. Furthermore, clear bilingual signage and directional flows have been added within Pingtung Transit Station, along with identification of bus platforms and route guidance for each bus line, differentiated by the color-coded planning of trunk line buses, providing a more visual way to guide passengers to conveniently take different routes.
In addition to relevant bilingual support tools, the county government also emphasizes enhancing the soft skills of frontline service personnel. The project specifically holds workshops on using real-time translation apps for bus and taxi drivers, as well as tourist information center staff. These workshops were completed on September 15th and 16th with three sessions held in northern, central, and southern Pingtung, respectively, receiving widespread acclaim. The bilingual workshops reduce service personnel's fear of using bilingual communication through lively and practical teaching, as well as exercise and practice, even engaging in actual conversations with foreigners. This enables them to easily handle various situations, ensuring that they can effectively communicate and resolve passenger problems, whether it's answering questions about routes and fares or dealing with unforeseen circumstances such as traffic changes and emergencies.
To showcase the concrete achievements of the project, the Pingtung County Government held a "Bilingual Easy Go" press conference. In addition to inviting foreign friends to conduct actual tourism conversation simulations, the conference also demonstrated the results of service personnel's actual use of bilingual hand-held signs and translation apps, accurately resolving transfer and transportation issues. The county government stated that it will continue to deepen foreign language-friendly services in the future, welcoming more tourists from all over the world to visit Pingtung and engage in barrier-free communication with transit stations or tourist service personnel, easily experiencing Pingtung's unique charm and rich cultural landscape. For more information, please visit the "Pingtung Travel Network" (https://i-pingtung.com/), and feel free to download the "Pingtung Go Fun" and "Pingtung Bus" apps to stay up-to-date on first-hand event information.