Legality of Tainan’s Liujia Ding medical district redevelopment questioned as city government responds

A Tainan city council inquiry has brought renewed attention to the redevelopment of the Liujia Ding medical district in Yongkang District, including its legality, land distribution and the public sale of development plots.

The city’s Land Administration Bureau said the urban plan was completed and that the so-called cost-recovery land had been publicly auctioned in accordance with the law. The plan, announced and implemented mainly in October 2021, includes residential areas, a medical zone, parks, public squares, parking lots and roads.

Officials described the land readjustment as a self-financing development project. Land obtained after the readjustment is sold publicly to recover construction and development costs. The bureau said the auction plan considered building setbacks, road access, traffic conditions, reasonable land use, market prices and the wider benefits of land utilization. The readjustment committee approved the plan before the sale.

The cost-recovery plots went to public auction in July. Officials said the sale was unrelated to any particular buyer or to the mayor’s term of office. Proceeds will first repay development costs. Any surplus may support the management, maintenance and use of public facilities in the district, the city said.

The city also highlighted infrastructure already in place. A public parking lot in the medical zone has opened, while a park that doubles as a flood detention basin can hold 3,400 cubic meters of water. Because some of Chi Mei Hospital’s existing off-site parking spaces will be temporarily unavailable during construction, the hospital created two parking lots on its own residential land, adding 129 car spaces. The city built another lot with 151 car spaces and 29 motorcycle spaces. Future development rules require at least 700 spaces each for cars and motorcycles.