Tough action against Hua Hin beach encroachers/demolition of pier restaurants

[Big Boy]

That's the way I've been starting to think about it - derelict pier that somebody has seen an opportunity to make some cash out of. Maintenance has been quite costly I would imagine. However, if you liken it to the guy who set up the cafe just behind the Chinese Temples, they didn't think twice about giving him the boot. I used to like whiling away an afternoon there with a banana smoothie.

IMHO the piers have character, but they have been occupied illegally. I just hope if they are demolished, what happens instead is thought through, and an improvement.

[hhfarang]

I just hope if they are demolished, what happens instead is thought through, and an improvement.

Did you forget where you are?

Incidentally, I enjoyed many a meal at those restaurants, especially in the early days when there weren't many restaurants in Hua Hin except the ones down town. I think they should come up with an arrangement for a settlement of estimated back taxes, lease the land to the ones who want to stay and be done with it.

Whatever they do with the beach if it is cleared will certainly not be as good as those pier restaurants are.

[HHTel]

IMHO the piers have character, but they have been occupied illegally. I just hope if they are demolished, what happens instead is thought through, and an improvement.

As I've already said. No-one can own, lease or anything else with the beach. International law states that beaches are outside of the country/mainland. Not even the local authorities here can build/replace what is earmarked to be knocked down.

[HHTel]

IMHO the piers have character, but they have been occupied illegally. I just hope if they are demolished, what happens instead is thought through, and an improvement.

As I've already said. No-one can own, lease or anything else with the beach. International law states that beaches are outside of the country/mainland. Not even the local authorities here can build/replace what is earmarked to be knocked down.

Legally that is!

[oakdale160]

"International law states" Can I remind you that we are in Thailand and nobody gives a monkey's about Thai law never mind International law

[londongeorge]

I was talking to a guy yesterday who has been here over 20 years, and he mentioned that in 1998 demolition was discussed. The outcome was that the restaurants paid the Police B1,000 per day, at that time bars were only paying B500 per month, and it was all forgotten about.

If rent is paid on these premises who is it paid to if no one owns them?

[caller]

As I've already said. No-one can own, lease or anything else with the beach. International law states that beaches are outside of the country/mainland. Not even the local authorities here can build/replace what is earmarked to be knocked down.

What you said was that you think there is an international law about this. Well if there is, the UK for one, which has many private beaches, chooses to ignore it. Strictly speaking, there isn't even a universal legal right to have access to a beach in the UK, it's all governed by various piecemeal regs and the Govt. recently turned down the idea of placing a 'legal right to roam' on all beaches.

So if it's good enough for the UK, it's probably good enough for Thailand.

[Strat1964]

Out of interest, does anybody know if they stole the land and built the piers as restaurants; or were the piers already in place, and they were occupied to prevent them becoming derelict, and of course maximising a business opportunity at the same time.

We can see the remains of some piers which have become victims of the weather. Were these fishing piers or restaurants before they collapsed?

How the piers were acquired would influence my view on the subject. If the current 'owners' are simply squatting on an existing structure, I'd feel more lenient towards them than if they'd actually built their business, pier and all on stolen land (of course, my feelings don't matter diddly squat). Occupying a derelict property and maintaining it, must be to their credit.

As one of the operator of businesses on the piers, I can see that many of you may have the wrong idea about us. Here are a few facts I would like to share with this community:

1) The land belong to Hua Hin City (Amphoe) and most of owners have been given this land to take care from the
municipality since already more than 20 years.
2) It is the historical part of Hua Hin, and all of the piers where existing fishing piers in the old days, and homes
for the fishermen
3) All business operators have proper rental contracts with the owners, and we do not 'squat' or take advantage of
free land. We pay quite significant rental for these places and most of us have invested millions of bahts to sanitize those places and maintain them
4) We do pay a lot of taxes. Provincial tax, revenue tax, personal tax, license tax, amphoe tax, building tax.
5) The sea is not so nice there, and one of the problems we have as operators is the tons of debris and pollution
that are rejected by the currents from Bangkok. We have to clean those debris on a regular basis to keep it clean.

We spend a lot of energy to keep these places alive and we are happy to do that. Every year, we accomodate thousands of tourists that love this area as it is. This makes Hua Hin quite special compared to Pranburi or Prachuap Kiri Khan. After the Hilton, the beach is 7 km long up to Koh Takiab, so I believe there is enough possibility to have nice walks on the beach.

Yes, we agree that it would be nice if the Naresdamri road would become a walking street. But we have to be realistic,
even if all buildings would be demolished, this road would be packed with traffic, since it will be the sole access to the
new harbour they are constructing now.

Finally, I think it is quite unfair to compare us to the beach boys from the other side, that had just laid some tables on the beach without proper authorizations. We have legitimate business, registered companies and infrastructures.

I hope this post will help you to see us more positively.

[Big Boy]

I thank you very much Strat1964. It is always good to hear the other side of the story, and very difficult to assess when you don't.

As I thought, maintaining seafront businesses can not be easy, and I'm sure without the intervention of you guys the structures would have fallen into disrepair years ago, so well done for preserving a little bit of old Hua Hin.

Your point number 3 is probably key to this. Who are the authorities actually after? I assume it must be the people you refer to as the 'owners', and I guess you guys, the business owners (tenants) are just innocent victims in this.

[caller]

Thanks for that info strat1964 and I hope everything goes well for you in this dispute. I have always enjoyed going to the piers for a meal and looking out over the sea and long may that continue!

[Strat1964]

This is very true Big Boy. Maintenance of these piers costs an arm and a leg every year.

As tenants we are just taken hostage of the situation and sometimes it is very difficult to get the right information from Thai people. At this moment there are many rumors going around and I do not want to comment on it.

I just wanted to state facts for the public to form a proper opinion. I know it is sometimes difficult to understand
the Thai concept that land has been given to 'take care'.

I think it is a political matter more than anything else, but i also suspect that some would like to enlarge the road to facilitate access to the new harbour site.

Given that this street will be in immediate proximity of this new harbour, and if the buildings would be demolished, it would not take long that this would become the same as Pattaya's walking street, which I think most of us don't want. But again this my 2 cents on this issue.

Finally, I went recently to Penang, where the same type of piers have been classified by Unesco as world heritage, and they have become a quite famous tourist attraction, although in my opinion they are far less interesting than the ones we have in Hua Hin. There might be an opportunity here to explore and make some heritage instead of thinking demolition.

Thanks for giving me the opportunity to respond.

[HHTel]

As I've already said. No-one can own, lease or anything else with the beach. International law states that beaches are outside of the country/mainland. Not even the local authorities here can build/replace what is earmarked to be knocked down.

What you said was that you think there is an international law about this. Well if there is, the UK for one, which has many private beaches, chooses to ignore it. Strictly speaking, there isn't even a universal legal right to have access to a beach in the UK, it's all governed by various piecemeal regs and the Govt. recently turned down the idea of placing a 'legal right to roam' on all beaches.

So if it's good enough for the UK, it's probably good enough for Thailand.

The beach between low and high tide belongs to the crown in the UK. The same rule in Thailand, in this case, the 'crown' is the King.
You are correct in that there is 'no right of access' and many beaches are cut off by private land owners.

[caller]

The beach between low and high tide belongs to the crown in the UK. The same rule in Thailand, in this case, the 'crown' is the King.

You are correct in that there is 'no right of access' and many beaches are cut off by private land owners.

Or even private beach owners.

It's quite funny that the UK owns only a transient bit of the beach, but it's enough to enable them to have a controlling interest that has never stopped huge chunks of it being sold off.

And most private beach owners do allow access to the beach, even Osborne House recently opened up their bit of the beach on the IOW. Understandably, the MOD are less welcoming.

Anyways,

[centermid7]

If I were given the choice of what we have in the business/waterfront area of HH versus what they have in Prachuab Kiri Khan I would take PKK every time.

Strat1964 has pointed out that the land was "owned" by the HH City Amphoe and given to the current "owners" but I don't think that land was really owned by HHC in the first place and thus was not theirs to give to anyone else.

[StevePIraq]

Surely all that has to be done is have a court order placed against each property giving notice to vacate, if no response just bulldoze the places to the ground.