Taroko National Park has carried out a visitor satisfaction survey. 93.4% of those interviewed were extremely satisfied or satisfied with the park’s overall performance, the highest percentage since 2008.

Taroko National Park Headquarters commissioned the National Park Association in Taiwan to carry out the survey. Researchers carried out random interviews on a monthly basis at the park’s main scenic spots at weekends, holiday times and weekdays and collected 1540 valid questionnaires. The items in the questionnaire included recreational facilities, public facilities, interpretation facilities, personnel service and overall satisfaction. In terms of overall park satisfaction, 80.0％ of those interviewed were satisfied and 13.4% were extremely satisfied, the two combined totaling 93.4%, higher than 87.0％ in 2008 and 88.5％ in 2009. Also, the level of satisfaction with various facilities and service was also the highest for three years; as for personnel service, the professionalism of interpreters, service attitude and the service attitude of employees also had excellent results, with the level of satisfaction with the service attitude of interpreters the highest, at 83.9%. These results show that Taroko has improved markedly both in terms of facilities and service.

During this research a large number of visitor opinions were also collected, the most numerous being about shortage of car parks and parking spaces, the danger of rock falls and about the need for fewer manmade facilities, all of which the park headquarters will consider in its efforts to improve park management.

A Taroko National Park Headquarters spokesperson said that last year (2010) the park received 2.85 million visitors, up by 560,000 on 2009’s 2.29 million, bringing NT$ almost 10 billion in economic benefit to the Hualian area. Taroko has always been a scenic spot popular with domestic and overseas visitors and has recently been listed as a 3-star “Sight you should not miss” by the Michelin Guide, showing that its unique scenery, ecology and cultural resources have a powerful attraction for domestic and overseas visitors. The spokesperson emphasized that exactly because it is so popular, conservation of sights and ecology, protecting visitors and serving visitors are aspects park management that are both important and difficult and which the park headquarters seek to carry out as effectively as possible.