County-controlled city

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is part of
a series on the
Administrative divisions
of the
Republic of China
In effect
Provinces
(streamlined)
Municipalities
Counties
Provincial cities
County-controlled cities
Districts
Urban townships
Rural townships
Urban villages
Rural villages
Neighborhoods
Suspended
Regions
(also known as "Areas")
Special administrative
regions (SARs)
Leagues
Special banners
Bureaus
Management bureaus
Banners
Compare
Administrative levels
and divisions of the
People's Republic of China




A county-controlled city (縣轄市 xiànxiáshì) is one of the 32 cities in Taiwan Province of the Republic of China administered under one of the 16 counties of the Republic of China. On the same level as a ROC township, it is the lowest-level city of ROC, below provincial and direct-control municipality. In contrast, the counties under the People's Republic of China cannot administer cities (but since it has prefecture-level city absent in ROC, it still has three kinds of cities as well). A county-controlled city has urban villages (里) directly under it.

The two criteria of a county-controlled city originally are:

  • population between 150,000 and 500,000
  • advanced industry and transportation network

The population criteria was originally 50,000 in the 1940s, but was raised to 100,000 in 1959, and again in 1977 to the present level.

At first, in late January 1946, there were only two county-controlled cities: Hualien and Yilan, which were prefecture-controlled cities (州轄市) under the Japanese Occupation. (The Kuomintang did not create such cities on the Mainland before they fled.) Taipei County has the most county-controlled cities (10). For all places ever obtained the county-controlled status, see the chart below:

[edit] Timeline

Below, unless noted otherwise in parenthesis, the newly created cities were towns that exceeded the 150,000 criteria.

Date Addition #
August 16, 1950 Chiayi (originally provincial city) 3
December 1, 1951 Hsinchu, Changhua, and Pingtung (originally provincial cities) 6
April 1, 1962 Sanchong City, Taipei County 7
July 1, 1962 Jhongli City, Taoyuan County 8
January 25, 1971 Taoyuan City, Taoyuan 9
July 1, 1972 Banciao City, Taipei and Fongshan City, Kaohsiung County 11
January 1, 1976 Taitung City, Taitung County 12
March 1, 1976 Fengyuan (Fongyuan), Taichung County 13
January 1, 1979 Yonghe City and Jhonghe City, Taipei 15
January 15, 1980 Sinjhuang (Hsinchuang) and Sindian City, Taipei 17
December 25, 1981 All county seats (originally jhen-township) upgraded to county-controlled cities, namely, 22
July 1, 1982 remove Hsinchu and Chiayi (to be provincial cities) 20
October 31, 1988 Jhubei, Hsinchu (county seat) 21
July 1, 1991 Taibao, Chiayi (county seat) 22
March 1, 1992 Pingjhen, Taoyuan 23
September 10, 1992 Puzih, Chiayi (originally siang-township, county seat) 24
May 1, 1993 Yongkang, Tainan (originally siang-township) 25
June 26, 1993 Tucheng City, Taipei 26
November 1, 1993 Dali, Taichung 27
January 1, 1995 Bade, Taoyuan 28
August 1, 1996 Taiping, Taichung 29
October 6, 1997 Lujhou City, Taipei 30
July 1, 1999 Sijhih (Hsichih), Taipei 31
October 4, 1999 Shulin City, Taipei 32

Lienchiang and Kinmen Counties do not have any cities.

Languages