Live cameras in Caotun, Taiwan

Caotun is an urban township in the northwest of Nantou County, in the middle of Taiwan, and with about 97,000 residents it is the most populous township on the island. It lies on the eastern edge of the Taichung basin, where the plain meets the foothills, so it feels like an extension of Taichung's suburbs on one side and the gateway to the mountains of Nantou on the other. The name comes from the old Hokkien form Chháu-ê-tun and was fixed in 1920 under Japanese rule. Caotun is known for its night market, the Taiwan Times Village theme park, the Yu-hsiu Museum of Art and Nan Kai University of Technology. Former vice president Wu Den-yih was born here.

Where two freeways meet

Caotun is a major road junction, and that explains the long camera list. National Freeway 3 runs through the township with a Caotun interchange at about kilometer 217.5, and National Freeway 6, which branches off just to the north at Wufeng, crosses the township with an East Caotun interchange before heading into the hills toward Puli, the main route to Sun Moon Lake and the high mountains of central Taiwan. Provincial Highway 3 also passes through on its way between Taichung and Nantou City. All the views come from Taiwan's Ministry of Transportation and Communications via the TDX open data platform, and each one is linked to its nearest place on our map. None of them is video; the frames simply renew themselves at regular intervals.

The township keeps standard Taiwan time, eight hours ahead of Greenwich, with no seasonal shift. Being inland, it is sheltered from the worst winter winds, with many clear, cool days from November to March, and hot, thundery afternoons in summer. Typhoons are most likely from July to October. Midsummer light holds until close to 6:45 in the evening; by the end of the year darkness arrives soon after 5. The interchange between the two freeways is a good place to look before long weekends, when traffic toward Sun Moon Lake and Puli builds up on Freeway 6.

Wufeng in Taichung, with the historic Lin family mansion and garden, is just across the Wu River to the north, and Nantou City, the county seat, lies a few minutes south.

Sources: Caotun - Wikipedia · National Freeway 3 (Taiwan) - Wikipedia · Provincial Highway 3 (Taiwan) - Wikipedia.