Alteration of an urban plan by the competent authority is a unilateral administrative act which, if it directly abridges the rights and privileges of people within a certain region or intensifies their burdens, has the characteristics of an administrative act. In the event the said action leads to the improper or unlawful impediment of the rights of a certain individual or an identifiable group of individuals, the said individual(s) shall be permitted to institute an appeal or administrative litigation as a relief. The foregoing shall supplement the explanation in this Yuan*s Interpretation No.148.

       The application at hand has been ruled by this Yuan*s Interpretation No. 148 as follows: "The competent authority*s alteration of an urban plan is not regarded as a person-specific administrative act by the administrative court, thereby barring the people from initiating administrative litigations against it. Based on the foregoing, the court has dismissed the application with a ruling. Although the said ruling is inconsistent with the said court*s precedents, it does not raise the issues as to the constitutionality of the laws or orders adopted by the final court judge." The applicant applied to the administrative court for a retrial in reliance on the foregoing, and requested an interpretation from this Yuan after the administrative court dismissed the case on procedural matters, based on its finding that the original ruling was not inconsistent with the court*s precedents.

       The Resolution of the 607th Council of Grand Justices Cooucil states: "Applications by the people for interpretations supplementing this Yuan*s interpretation on their initial applications, once determined to be based on reasonable cause, shall be handled and interpreted in accordance with Article 4, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 2, of the Grand Justices Council Adjudication Act." The court should render a supplementary interpretation in answer to the application at hand pursuant to the abovementioned Resolution.

       Alteration of an urban plan by the competent authority is a unilateral administrative act which, if it directly abridges the rights and privileges of people within a certain region or intensifies their burdens, has the characteristics of an administrative act. In the event the said action leads to the improper or unlawful impediment of the rights of a certain individual or an identifiable group of individuals, the said individual(s) shall be permitted to institute an appeal or administrative litigation as a relief in accordance with Article 1 and Article 2, Paragraph 1, of the Administrative Appeal Act and Article 1 of the Administrative Proceedings Act. The foregoing is consistent with the objectives of the people*s right of appeal and of administrative litigation protected by the Constitution. Individual alterations to this urban plan are different from the draft and announcement of the urban plan and the necessary alterations, by the drafting authority pursuant to its regular full analysis over the five-year period stipulated by the regulations, which do not directly impair the rights or add burden to the people within the region. Judgment P.T. No.192 (Ad.Ct., 1970) states: "Unilateral administrative acts, whether they are targeted at a specific individual or a group of relevant individuals, by the government pursuant to its right to administration and in response to factual matters cannot be said to be non-administrative acts if the said actions produce tangible results in the context of public law. People whose rights or interests have been impaired by the said administrative acts may appeal for relief. The foregoing is different from the general measures imposed by the government on the public or abstract rules on concrete matters that do not produce tangible results in the context of public law or impact on their rights or interests. In this case, the defendant public authority altered the urban plan that it had announced ...the plaintiff*s appeal, against the defendant public authority*s alteration plan, based on the argument that the said alteration will diminish the value of its land thereby injuring its interests, is not prohibited by the law." The objective of the foregoing is consistent with this Interpretation. The said Yuan, when handling the case at hand, did not consider or determine the substance of this administrative litigation matter concerning the alteration of an urban plan. Rather, the same Court dismissed the applicant*s claim, by its Ruling No.103 (Ad.Ct., 1976), based on the reasoning that since the relevant authority*s alteration of an urban plan is not an administrative act targeted at specific individuals, the people may not initiate appeals or administrative litigations against the said act. The Ruling is incompatible with this Yuan*s reasoning set forth above. Thus, the reasoning shall supplement this Yuan*s Interpretation No.148.

*Translated by THY Taiwan International Law Offices.