Taipei's year-end mayoral race is heating up, with the ruling party's candidate attacking the incumbent's record on traffic and food safety — bad news for Chiang Wan-an's re-election pitch.

• DPP candidate Puma Shen says good policies from the Ko Wen-je era, including traffic fixes and food-safety tracking, were dropped once Chiang Wan-an took over.
• Shen denies he is using Ko to attack Chiang, saying he just wants voters to judge him on his plans for the city.
• His platform leans on traffic, child protection, and more green space rather than party lines.
• The opposition blue-white alliance looks shaky, with Chiang refusing to campaign for individual Taiwan People's Party candidates and holding joint rallies instead — which some TPP councillors read as a snub.

Outlook: Expect the Taipei race to stay focused on continuity of city policy, with the fragile blue-white alliance the main thing to watch before the year-end vote.