Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an said on Oct. 8 that he plans to relocate Songshan Airport and convert the airport and surrounding land, a combined 300 hectares, into a "Taipei AI Park." Taipei City Government estimates the project could generate NT$12 trillion in output.
But the proposal is not new. According to BlockTempo, at least seven Taipei mayoral candidates, including Chiang, have publicly called for moving Songshan Airport since 2000. Of the six before him, five lost their races. The only one who won, Ko Wen-je, served two full terms as mayor and the airport still did not move.
Who has proposed moving Songshan Airport
In 2002, Democratic Progressive Party candidate Lee Ying-yuan ran for Taipei mayor on a platform that included relocating Songshan Airport and building a central park for the capital. He described it as a "green diamond" that could create NT$1.1 trillion in value, but lost to incumbent Ma Ying-jeou.
In 2006, DPP Taipei mayoral candidate Frank Hsieh argued at a policy forum that Songshan Airport should be turned into a park. He lost, and Hau Lung-bin won the election.
In 2009, Kuomintang legislator Alex Tsai proposed a "New Songshan Airport" that would move the runway offshore between Tamsui and Sanzhi, with his own estimate putting the cost at NT$36 billion. He later used the same plan in the KMT’s 2014 Taipei mayoral primary, but because Sean Lien became the party’s official nominee, BlockTempo said Tsai does not count as a formal candidate in that election.
Also in 2014, Ko Wen-je said the Airport MRT, Taoyuan Airport’s third terminal, and a third runway made relocation objectively possible. He also said any relocation timeline would certainly run longer than a single four-year mayoral term.
In November 2015, then-Deputy Mayor Lin Chin-jung said Songshan Airport would complete relocation in 2020. At the same event, Ko said the airport could not be abolished at that point and that Taipei could not decide the matter on its own. In 2017, Lin raised the issue again, and Civil Aeronautics Administration Director-General Lin Kuo-hsien responded on the spot that it would be impossible within 20 years. Ko completed two terms, and the 2020 target was not met.
During the 2018 Taipei mayoral race, DPP candidate Pasuya Yao called for abolishing Songshan Airport and building a large central park. He also said that if it was not done by 2022, he would pitch a tent on the runway and let planes roll over it. KMT candidate Ting Shou-chung said the airport could be moved in the future, but none of the plans discussed by candidates could be completed within a first term. Yao finished third, while Ting lost to Ko by 3,254 votes.
In 2022, independent candidate Huang Shan-shan listed "relocating Songshan Airport" as the longest-term solution to traffic problems in Neihu Technology Park and finished third. In December that year, the issue spilled into a legislative by-election, where DPP candidate Wu I-nung proposed moving Songshan Airport after Taoyuan Airport’s third runway is completed and finalizing the decision within two years.
At the time, Chiang, who had just been elected mayor, said relocation would require thorough coordination between the central and local governments and "should never be rolled out hastily just because an election is approaching." BlockTempo noted that the line now reads with some irony.
Ma Ying-jeou is often included in lists of politicians tied to the idea, but the report said his own position was the opposite. After winning re-election in 2002, Ma met then-President Chen Shui-bian, who said relocation was only a matter of time. Ma replied that there was little room to discuss it before cross-strait direct flights were settled and before the Airport MRT opened.
Why the plan keeps stalling
The mayor does not control the decision
BlockTempo said Songshan is a joint civil-military airport under the Civil Aeronautics Administration and the Ministry of National Defense. Its total area is about 213 hectares, and the military holds more than half of it. In March 2023, Transport Minister Wang Kwo-tsai told lawmakers there was no short-term relocation plan because the airport’s importance was too high.
Traffic collapsed, then recovered
Annual passenger volume was about 15 million around 1997. After Taiwan High Speed Rail began service in 2007, domestic traffic fell sharply, dropping to about 3.1 million in 2009. Those were the years when arguments for shutting Songshan were at their strongest.
That changed after the Ma administration repositioned Songshan as a direct-flight airport, opening scheduled cross-strait routes as well as flights to Shanghai Hongqiao, Tokyo Haneda, and Seoul Gimpo. By 2019, passenger volume had climbed back to 6.35 million.
Taoyuan Airport expansion has been delayed again and again
The Airport MRT opened in 2017, but Taoyuan Airport’s third terminal, which in 2015 was expected to be completed in 2020, now has a target date of 2027 for the main terminal structure, seven years later than originally planned.
The third runway was originally scheduled for completion in 2030. BlockTempo said Taoyuan International Airport Corp. stated in October 2025 that more than 600 households on the planned site had yet to relocate, with an initial estimate pushing completion to 2032.
No replacement has been identified for military, offshore-island, and diversion roles
Songshan still handles several functions that have no clear substitute. The Air Force Songshan Base Command and the National Airborne Service Corps are stationed there, and the presidential aircraft also uses the airport. In 2017, CAA Director-General Lin Kuo-hsien said about 800,000 offshore-island travelers used Songshan as their gateway. In 2022, DPP Penghu legislator Yang Yao also opposed Wu I-nung’s relocation proposal on that basis.
Songshan is also the nearest diversion airport for Taoyuan Airport.
The report’s bottom line was simple: most of the people who proposed moving the airport never won office, and the one who did did not have a term long enough to complete a project of that scale.
What is different this time
BlockTempo said there are some differences in this round. Chiang is the sitting mayor, and the proposal was presented by the city government at a press conference during his re-election campaign, though the report noted it came rather late. The rationale has also shifted from earlier themes such as parkland or lifting height restrictions to land for the AI industry.
The city government also offered estimates on land allocation, 65,000 jobs, and said the plan could unlock 570 hectares of urban renewal areas affected by building-height restrictions tied to the airport.
Supporting conditions are also better than before. The Airport MRT is already in service, and the north concourse of Taoyuan Airport’s third terminal has opened.
What has not changed
The central government said it was not consulted in advance
Cabinet spokesperson Lee Hui-chih said, "We were also quite surprised, because Taipei City did not discuss this with the central government," while also citing what Chiang had said four years earlier.
Deputy Transport Minister Chen Yen-po, who is also acting chairman of Taoyuan International Airport Corp., said Taipei City Government had not approached either the Ministry of Transportation or Taoyuan Airport about the issue over the past four years. He added that relocation of Songshan was not built into the original planning assumptions for the third terminal and third runway. In a written response, the ministry described Songshan as "critical national infrastructure" and said any decision would require prudent evaluation from the perspective of the country as a whole, without giving a timetable.
There is still no answer on where military units would go
Chiang said the issue touches many areas and would have to be planned jointly with the central government, but the direction should be made clear. He also said there are currently no fighter jets at Songshan and that disaster prevention and rescue work could rely on helicopters.
The timeline points to 2033, but the key runway has already been delayed once
Chiang tied the timeline to 2033, saying Taoyuan Airport’s third runway could absorb Songshan’s traffic once it opens that year. He said there are still about six years before then and that a full evaluation should start now.
That runway has already been delayed once. Former National Cheng Kung University associate professor of transportation management Tai Tso-min said shifting all of Songshan’s traffic to Taoyuan would cause Taoyuan to hit its capacity ceiling earlier. He said finding a suitable place to build an airport is "far more difficult than finding a place for an AI park."
The issue returns as the election nears
With about seven weeks left until the Nov. 28 local elections, Chiang’s rival Shen Pao-yang said politicians across party lines have discussed relocating Songshan for years. He noted that the airport sits in the constituency Chiang once represented as a legislator, and said that counting Chiang’s years in the legislature and his four-year mayoral term, the total is close to 10 years. Shen asked what preparations Chiang had made during that time.
Shen also said it is a good thing to discuss city policy. The source text did not include the rest of his remarks.