Dr. Ou Chin-Der, Chief Executive Officer

Alex Chang, Chief Operating Officer Railway Operation Division

K. H. Kee, Executive VP Construction Management & Procurement Division

William R. Donald, Executive VP Railway Operation Division

Samuel P. Lin, VP Operations Sub-Division Railway Operation Division

Dr. Jeder Hseih, Chief Engineer, Engineering sub-division Construction
Management Division

Taiwan High Speed Rail Corporation (THSRC)

Re:  A heartfelt thanks

Dear Dr. Ou and THSRC colleagues:

I like to take this opportunity of my one hour and 40 minutes of serene time
on the high speed travel from Taipei to Tainan to say a word of thanks to
you, for your hospitality and for some feedback on our information rich
discussions during the morning session and sumptuous lunch.  Although I do
not speak for my Texas colleagues, I cannot imagine that they did not take
away the same feeling of warmth as I did.

In our discussions, I found out that TaiwanHSRC is facing operationally
challenging issues. On the other hand, such issues are also presenting to
the entire research communities in Taiwan, and maybe to the entire Asia
Pacific region, some of the most exciting intellectually and visionary
challenges.  Solving these issues in a timely manner may not only benefit
Taiwan, but Asia Pacific in general. With accelerated political and
demographical transformation of Asia Pacific, and with Asia Pacific rapidly
gaining global economic importance on the world scene, these challenges
require intensive, sustainable and well defined time scale efforts. It is no
wonder that under the leadership of Dr. Ou, a powerful team of leaders were
created to move TaiwanHSRC forward!

In this respect, I felt extraordinarily lucky because purely serendipity
that I have the opportunity to interact with both "THSRC," T as in Taiwan
and T as in Texas.

My six years in Texas as Vice President for Research and Economic
Development of the University of Texas at Dallas convinced me that
developing a highspeed rail is no longer a luxury, but a must for that
region. The triangle defined by DFW-Houston-San Antonio is crying for a high
speed ground transportation.  Without it, the economic and quality-of-life
development of this triangle in the 21st century will be chocked by massive
traffic jams and by unsustainable short haul air transportation, not to
mention the environmental degradation and the associated calamities. It was
for these reasons that when I met the visionary David Dean, who despite of
obvious difficulties such as the lack of a national policy, was able to
understand these issues for Texas clearly and succinctly, creating a
powerful coalition of political and commercial forces, and saw that he was
willing to put a great deal of his personal energy and resources into this
arduous effort, to work with the TexasHSRC towards such a lofty goal seems,
to me, to be a no brainer.

Then equally by coincident is that after I worked with David, I moved to
Tainan's National Cheng Kung University. Several things became apparent with
respect to the Texas effort in this move.

-        First, I moved to NCKU in Tainan, not a university in the northern
part of Taiwan. I came to NCKU eight months ago, about 6 months after the
Taiwan High Speed rail initiated its operation.  In other words, I came to
Taiwan only after it has a "high speed rail culture (HSRC)," not before. Had
I move to the northern part of Taiwan, having a HSRC would merely be for me
"icing on a cake."  To me, for the southern part of Taiwan in general and
NCKU in particular, having HSRC is the cake, not the icing.  Basking in
HSRC, I can already see the transformation of Tainan and NCKU, economically
and intellectually. As one of the two research intensive and comprehensive
universities in Taiwan, to be immersed in a HSRC will allow us a less
arduous roadmap towards world class status.  Without it, it may take twice
as long, if ever.

-        Second, there are considerable similarities in the Texas T-Bone and
Taiwan High Speed Rail projects. Both serve roughly the same number of
population, T-Bone 17.5 million and Taiwan HSR 23 million. Both could be
regarded as gateways to significantly larger regions than themselves:  Texas
as the gateway to the Latin World and Taiwan as the gateway to the Asia
Pacific world.  What ever uncertainties there may be, and there surely are,
serving as gateways, having a high speed rail would not only spur economic
and intellectual activities, it will also spur touristic activities.  It is
in this sense that having a truly robust "roadmap" for the high speed rail
systems for both regions must be exciting.

-        Third, as a university with engineering as its genesis, it is not a
surprise that our alumni have played an incredible role in the development
of Taiwan's high speed rail. A shining example of this is that Dr. Ou is one
of our most outstanding civil engineering graduates! In my two brief
meetings with him, once in NCKU and then yesterday, I found him to not only
be charismatic, but visionary as well. I also found him to follow the
principle mentioned by one of US National Science Foundation directors:
"First rate people will find first rate people, second rate people will find
third rate people."  Hence, in order for Dr. Ou to run one of the most
complex and the newest surface transportation system in the world so
successfully, having first rate people around Dr. Ou is a must.  And it is!

Finally, it is also exciting for me to discover that within NCKU, we have
considerable strengths in transportation management, civil engineering,
optimizations, urban economic and land use planning. Although these
activities are distributed in three different colleges, I am confident that
with three outstanding Deans, we can undoubtedly develop a coordinated and
integrated team to interact with both TaiwanHSRC and TexasHSRC!

Warmest personal regards

Da Hsuan

Da Hsuan Feng

Senior Executive Vice President

National Cheng Kung University

Tainan, Taiwan