akalra1187

NH/JL @:-)

Failing that SQ/GA/QF/KE/OS?

tai4de2

Do any of those fly non-stop from Toronto (where it seems mapleg may be located) to Taipei?

mapleg

The only nonstop from Toronto is EVA. AC is also a 1 stop possibility.

Dave510

I don't think anyone denies that the BR J lounge in TPE leaves many wanting.

The fact of the matter is if you want an excellent all-around flight experience, then you'll have to live with the subpar lounge experience (a fair trade for me, personally, as I care about the 15 hours on a plane far more than whatever time I spend in a lounge).

If the lounge experience is important to you, then there are better alternatives, such as CX and their excellent Pier J lounge in HKG (but subpar in flight experience).

If you want to fly direct to/from TPE/, then I'm afraid there just aren't many options.

longtimeflyin

16.4 hours.

worldclubber

The TPE lounges are fine, if you do not want to spend your day there. The Infinity has showers with toilets, a fairly decent food spread and an OK drink selection. Nothing wrong with it.

east_west

My two cents...

TPE's BR Infinity/Star are equal to or better than J lounges in NRT/ICN for NH/OZ. TPE's SQ, ICN OZ J, NRT NH J lounge can be better/worse than Infinity/Star depending on time-of-day load factors and individual food/drink preferences -- they all have pro's and con's. TPE SQ is often less crowded because most traveler's don't think of going there, but the food/drink selection is clearly inferior. BR's Garden is definitely a step up from all of these if you are BR Diamond.

HND NH J is not in the class of any of these. Neither is HKG, with lounges occupying the open air top floor of a loud terminal with poor A/C.

For other *A hubs, only SIN J (but not SIN's Star Gold lounge) and ZRH's J lounges are markedly better. OS J in VIE is about the same, but MUC/FRA are clearly a step below and North America/PEK aren't really in the conversation.

tai4de2

Food in SQ lounge is smaller in selection but what’s there is at least edible.

bocastephen

I don't understand the hate for BR lounges - compared to other *A lounges, they are far superior to anything out there aside from SQ and maybe NH - been to an Air Canada MLL? Garbage. United Club? A joke. Asiana? A poor comparison. Aside from SQ and NH, BR pretty much leads *A with both lounges and seats - they only come up short on inflight service quality/maturity.

As for TPE, I have connections with airport management and the answer regarding priority access is basically the wrong answer and I've pounded on them constantly over it - they feel everyone should be treated the same at the airport, no one group should have priority access to security or immigration, and even their participation with APEC is grudging and took months of complaints and corrective action requests to get implemented the right way - even their inbound and outbound APEC immigration desks are designed to be hidden, inconvenient, and airport staff will go out their way to keep people away from these areas if asked their location.

I've explained to them multiple times that this view is not realistic, it's not in line with other airports who want to be taken seriously, and it potentially impacts their market position and perception and needs to be changed. Granted, there is little space for a big setaside like the *G Fast Track facility at NRT, but a single entry point for all Business/First/Premium FF into the clustercrap security mess to cut the line is absolutely essential. I can't be the sole voice advocating for this, so please comment, complain and make your voices heard to wear down their resistance.

mjcewl1284

You're not alone on this bocastephen . Having been flying to/from TPE 50+ times/year since the late 2000s, I write comment cards, tell airport personnel willing to listen, etc. at every single given moment. Every time I'm done with security check and lining up for immigrations, if the automated security check is empty, I will make a point of this with any person in uniform. And more often than not it is.

I already complained about this earlier in the thread so I will make my argument short and simple: it is absolutely ridiculous to have more than 5 people holding Taiwan passports lining up with everyone else when they should be using the automated lanes at any given time. Hong Kong has made it almost seamless for their own citizens to use these automated lanes, why not Taiwan?

hayzel7773

TPE Airport Management is terrible, the people simply don't care because every election, there is a management change if the party switches! Why bother if they know that eventually, they will be kicked to the curb?

Look at the flooding, they didn't give a crap and airlines were making their own contingency plans while the airport just passed all the blame to the construction company. CI was using their crew buses to bus people from T2 to T1 for checkin, EVA had to pull buses from their city service/remote gate bus to help move people around. Where was the airport authority? Busy going through management change during the chaos.
They don't even take care of the airport taxiways, EVA had to put in a 10knot taxi speed restriction after a piece of asphalt took out a piece of the elevator on one of the A321s. EVA sent the airport the bill and to this day, it still hasn't been paid. CI also had a 737's gear damaged due to a massive pothole that the airport failed to repair.
After the runways were completely repaved, they realized that their was water seeping up from the concrete and it was destroying it. What did they do? Nothing.

In the terminal, they are severely understaffed for security and immigration. The airport was so understaffed they began to utilize parts of the military for its passenger security screening ops! Immigration is bad too, those fingerprint machines are a hassle and they don't work very well, they really should invest in the ones that they use in the US or Singapore. They also expanded the security area, but for what? There is no one manning the machines...

EVA has consistently bugged airport management many times regarding these issues(I'm sure CI does too) but the response is always:
1. Lack of Space
2. Lack of Manpower
3. Lack of Funds
4. Will greatly affect airport ops
5. Simply isn't fair to other pax

You don't need to do two dedicated lanes to make both home airlines happy, just have one priority lane that is dedicated to Gold Track, Skyteam, and all the other premium pax.

username

Stop complaining! The Government is working hard at it! They are doing all they can to reduce tourists from Mainland China to improve your TPE airport experience

I think no one really thought BR and CI will grow this big + all the other LCC and Mainland carriers. So, again, they did not plan like ICN, HKG, BKK or NRT. The political influences and all the politics/corruption/delays that comes with democracy/construction/development/"fat cat jobs" also do not help. The whole island argues every day on trivial stuff (like now some want to move it to GMT+9 to align with Japan) while the world passes by it.

username

The Taiwan process for eGate is actually really really simple compared to things like GlobalEntry and it is immediate. It is strange why people don't take the time to apply.

https://www.immigration.gov.tw/lp.as...BaseDSD=7&mp=2

bocastephen

Unlike HK, the eligibility list for Taiwan E-Gate is very limited.

evergrn

I don't know why you say that, although I admit I'm not a lounge expert. Really liked the SQ lounge in TPE. Certainly compares favorably to any UA, AC, or even BR or NH lounges I've been to. I've only been to one other SQ lounge which is HKG, but the TPE one is certainly no worse. To me the only difference between the two is that TPE's is smaller and has windows. Despite being a small operation, the quality/selection of food there is on par with HKG's. I'm actually surprised that SQ even maintains a lounge at TPE.