七股鹽場頂山生產區

July 17th, 2026

The No. 2 Pump House can be found next to the newly-built Western Coastal Expressway.

Qigu Saltworks (七股鹽場) was the largest salt field in Taiwan and the last to shut down in 2002. Dingshan Village (頂山里) was the site of the 1st Production Area (第一生產區) of the saltworks, largely on land expropriated from the local population, who had previously prospered as fish farmers. Numerous relics of the saltworks can be found scattered across this eerily flat part of coastal Tainan, and several earned heritage status under the name Qigu Saltworks Capital Reduction Building Group (七股鹽場減資建物群) in 2009. The most prominent of these is Dingshan Watchtower (頂山鹽警槍樓), which is featured in its own entry.

Gathered here are some of the remaining structures around the production area, most prominently a pump house recognized for its heritage value but frequently misidentified in what little literature is available. This is neither the Dingshan Saltworks Office (頂山場務所) nor the 4th Production Area Office (第四生產區場務所); it is, in fact, the 1st Production Area No. 2 Pump House (第一生產區2號抽水機房), confirmed from a close reading of cadastral maps and the original heritage designation.

The power pole towering over the pump house is no longer connected to the grid.

The rooftop is punctured in several places, a consequence of decades of exposure to the harsh coastal environment.

Looking south from the pump house. The machinery is gone but sluice gates can still be discerned in the distance.

Rusty pipes leading to a reinforced concrete structure immediately to the south. It is unclear how the pump house operated, but the main salt fields lay beyond the highway in the background.

An oblique view from the outer channel. None of this is directly connected to the sea; there are gates to the north and south controlling water flow to this location.

One last photo deserving of commentary: this lone power pole stands along the southwestern margins of the production area, one of the last of a series of timber poles that once traversed this desolate landscape. Most of these poles have already been replaced, where they are even necessary any more, so this was a chance find.