What Hua hin REALLY needs is....

[usual suspect]

Yes I know we've had this topic before, but new suggestions may crop
up this time round....?
OK here's my few thats buzzin in my head just now.

1. A footbridge (lit up at nte) from the police station to Saturkarn Sq./
HH shopping mall.
2. A bridge over the railway on Chomsin Rd that includes U-turns and
filters and ends over on the Pala-U road...(make the bit where Gee
supermarket is a dead-end...no crossing).
3. A proper entrance to huahin beach,-not a little alley-way with broken
lumps of concrete for steps.
this to include:- * no horses blocking the way.
* a proper place to sit down and wash the sand from
your feet with a hose FOR FREE...not some old bag
charging you 10baht for a plaggy tub-full of seawater.
4. How about the idea of an 'ex-pat' committee to liase with the local
ampher to forward ideas like these, improvements that the farangs
really need, not things like extra flower beds or a new wide-screen TV
in the police station...(you lot know what I'm gettin at).

5. Put a brake on tuk-tuks trawling round the streets at 10kms/hour
looking for customers...tuk-tuk ranks, hell we can all walk to find 'em.

Yeah I could go on, but reckon I'll leave room for your ideas....?????

[Wanderlust]

All good suggestions, and ones that have also occurred to me, but without being negative there are several reasons why these won't happen.

1. A footbridge (lit up at nte) from the police station to Saturkarn Sq./
HH shopping mall.

Thais won't use it, therefore it won't be built.

2. A bridge over the railway on Chomsin Rd that includes U-turns and filters and ends over on the Pala-U road...(make the bit where Gee supermarket is a dead-end...no crossing).

Although something does need to be done about that railway crossing, this isn't it in my opinion, and I gather other plans have been drawn up. I actually don't believe there is room to build the bridge you are suggesting without major demolition of houses and businesses, and i have been told that the reason the Klong Road ends at the golf driving range is because the land beyond that is owned by someone important who wouldn't sell it. If a bridge was possible i think it would need to go through where the driving range is rather than the existing crossing. There is absolutely no chance that any plan that restricts access to the supermarket will be approved as the family that own it apparently have a big say in all things Hua Hin.

3. A proper entrance to huahin beach,-not a little alley-way with broken lumps of concrete for steps this to include:-
* no horses blocking the way.
* a proper place to sit down and wash the sand from your feet with a hose FOR FREE...not some old bag charging you 10baht for a plaggy tub-full of seawater.

That entrance to the beach is pretty horrible, but to be honest, those who live here rarely go to that stretch of beach so the only benefit would be for the tourists. In my opinion Hua Hin has reached breaking point as far as coping with tourists (both farang and Thai) goes - water, sanitation, roads, parking and probably others already can't cope with the numbers that come here, so a few things to put them off might be a good thing!

4. How about the idea of an 'ex-pat' committee to liase with the local ampher to forward ideas like these, improvements that the farangs really need, not things like extra flower beds or a new wide-screen TV in the police station...(you lot know what I'm gettin at).

Great idea, but you forget that we farangs are regarded by the powers that be as they would a nasty smell, or maybe a better analogy would be to imagine there is a solid gold bar lying at the bottom of a septic tank. The owners of the tank want the gold bar but aren't prepared to dig through the muck to get it, so they allow others to live with them on condition that they consume the contents of the tank to allow them to pick up the gold bar without dirtying their hands. Of course once the gold is in their hands, what use do they have of those who got it for them? None, so they kick them out.

5. Put a brake on tuk-tuks trawling round the streets at 10kms/hour looking for customers...tuk-tuk ranks, hell we can all walk to find 'em.

To be honest I have never found the tuk tuks a problem in Hua Hin, and there are several places where they congregate. The bigger pain, given the pressure there is on parking spaces in the town, are the permanently parked 'taxis' and 'tour guides' along the street between the police station and the night bazaar, as well as the motorbikes and plastic seats that park in spaces designed for cars. Must get myself one of those plastic seats, bet they're good on fuel economy...

As I said, I don't mean to sound negative, just realistic. We can compose as many wish lists as we like, but we are not voters, and have chosen to live here, rather than having to. It obviously ain't that bad, and nothing and no-one is perfect!

[richard]

Come on guys. Why change it? TIT

Do you really want a western holiday resort??

Khon Khaen here I come if it happens

[redzonerocker]

i agree with richard on this one.
sometimes changes aren't usually for the better. i liked hua hin as with much of thailand for its unusual ways & methods. totally different to anywhere i've ever been.
maybe some areas where danger is involved could be bettered.
if i do end up one day as a resident of hua hin, which is quite likely, i would just accept it for what it is with all its little faults & irritations.

[buksida]

I think some changes are necessary especially when public safety is concerned, as the town grows in terms of development and population the infrastructure should grow with it.

[Chas]

I agree with the suggestions so far and definately SOME method of getting tourists across the main road to the Night Markets/Satukarn Square that does not involve actually walking in the road is necessary.

Tourists all seem to come from countries where pedestrians have the "right of way" and nobody tells them that in Thailand NOBODY has the right of way and you take what you can get when you can get it.

Don't know how many times I have narrowly missed tourists stepping off without a glance OR even more interesting with a hand held up like a traffic cop. Whether the Thais use a bridge or not is beside the point as Thais are not the ones you almost hit crossing from the night market.

The beach entrance is deplorable for a tourist town, but the rich tourists don't use it so it probably will never be improved.

My question here: Why does HUA HIN have such terrible infrastructure and so few improvements? I presume ( and if you know better just say so) that a LOT of money comes into this town and that SOME of that money goes to the tessabaan. The money goes in ( to a little tin box??) but it doesn't seem to come out in the form of public works thats for sure.

ITEM: Soi 102 has to be the worst road I have ever driven on in my five years in Thailand and I include the frequent trip to my spouse's small very poor village near Udonthani. The roads in Udon are generally much better and it is NOT a tourist area.

ITEM: "Disfunction junction" Nobody can solve this mess and nobody had the foresight to see it coming and just getting worse and worse?

ITEM: getting into and out of the new Mall...with the billions of baht expended on this project, nobody in the tessabaan thought about access? A flying ramp to enter from the northern side of the street would have been a drop in the bucket to build, wouldnt have deterred the developers for a second had it been demanded and saved all the aggravation of closed u-turns and that thing they do with the traffic cones every so often.

Please note that these three items (and the list could go on and on ) heavily impact the Thai residents as much as they do ex-pats and tourists.

These are just "people" items that create appallingly dangerous, unpleasant, time-wasting situations for all of us every day and which do nothing to preserve the "attractiveness" or "old-fashioned charm" of the Hua Hin of yore which some of you are concerned with ( and which is gone for good anyway).

[STEVE G]

ITEM: Soi 102 has to be the worst road I have ever driven on in my five years in Thailand and I include the frequent trip to my spouse's small very poor village near Udonthani. The roads in Udon are generally much better and it is NOT a tourist area.

Although I’ve been on worst roads in Thailand, most of those times I wasn’t always sure I was actually on a road. I would agree with you that most of the roads in rural Thailand are actually better than soi 102, even the compacted dirt roads are easier to drive on than a broken surfaced road.

[The understudy]

Hallo There Chas

I maybe have the answer that you where asking may I quote you!

[quote Chas]My question here: Why does HUA HIN have such terrible infrastructure and so few improvements? I presume ( and if you know better just say so) that a LOT of money comes into this town and that SOME of that money goes to the tessabaan. The money goes in ( to a little tin box??) but it doesn't seem to come out in the form of public works thats for sure.[/quote]

Well Many of those people who are working @ the Tessaban simply have no proper knowledge about City Planning and the associated improvements of infrastructurre that should be done in keeping a city running. The head of the Tessaban is thinks that the funds that was giving to him every year to suppose to go for improvements is going to his own money box as his Salary and of his workers. When a infrastucture URGENLTY needs to be improved then the board members will vote for it and the head of gives the money. If the Central Govt. demands to see waht improvments had been made The Tessaban quickly doing some Cosmetic improvements with little amount of money to spent to show that they had done something. The major problems remains untouched until they suffeer on a daily basis from this problem!
Those pepple should play the PC Game Sim City 4 to really get in tune what's proper City Planning is all about.
Your's The understudy
"Irie Daily!!!"

[webmaster]

My question here: Why does HUA HIN have such terrible infrastructure and so few improvements? I presume ( and if you know better just say so) that a LOT of money comes into this town and that SOME of that money goes to the tessabaan. The money goes in ( to a little tin box??) but it doesn't seem to come out in the form of public works thats for sure.

Here is more to add on to Understudy's post to explain the legal side of this issue.

In Thailand, not like most of the EU governments, all the funds collected by the local authorities go to the Central Government. At the end of each year the local governments have to submit their needs and projects and ask for an annual budget for the next year.

Depending on the population, importance and urgency, the central government will approve their budget needs and release the funds.

Now here is the part where it gets all messed up.

Hua Hin, like other tourist attraction places (Pattaya, Phuket, Samui, etc) generates more money than lets say Nakhon Nowhere, but since Nakhon Nowhere is a city not town and has more population than Hua Hin, still gets a bigger budget than Hua Hin, which they don't need.

In the last 3 months the Phuket local government (OrBorJor) trying to get all the residents to update/register their residency (Tabian Baan) in Phuket, officially the local population is less than 400,000 but in reality this number is almost triple (new businesses are opening and people are immigrating from other parts of Thailand to get a better job in Phuket, same as Hua Hin).

Since the residence number is small, than the official number, there isn't enough police force, ambulance, fire fighters or not enough budget to improve the infrastructure - as similar to Hua Hin.

The easiest way to solve the problem is to give local funds to the local governments, but it's easier said than done. None of the top officials want to loose their position and control of the whole funds coming to Bangkok.

So all the decision is made in Bangkok not here in Hua Hin, regardless of what the locals and their local government wants.

[redzonerocker]

very informative webmaster, though i do see similarities with the way local councils are run in the uk.
my local city council would be a prime example of this. money spent & or wasted on useless projects whilst the major issues that really need addressing are neglected.
unless the local thai population insist on changes that need to be made, i can't see anything productive happening.

[webmaster]

Sure but there is big difference there as well, the non-confrontational Thai culture not to loose face as well as Pii-Nong issue doesn't apply to UK, also most of the Hua Hin families are connected to each other one way another, that makes the criticism between them even more difficult.

It's just a small snippet of SE Asian culture, unless we understand the culture in-depth we can't really see the real causes of the problems.

[redzonerocker]

yes i agree, but i like the thai culture because its so different. i do intend to learn a lot more about it in the near future. more from the study of the people than by books.
i'm sure over time there will be changes to hua hin, just in their own time.

[Chas]

Very interesting post webmaster and I did not know any of this information. I did not know that funds go to Bkk and get returned on an annual project by project basis. However, an imaginative and creative tessabaan, it seems to me, could do a lot with arranging private donations from businesses and individuals, let alone make a very strong case to Bkk for the priorities on my short list ( that's my own personal view of things to be certain, but I wonder what might be on THEIR list as priorities)

And as much as we may laugh at the "McDonald's take away booth" on the corner by the police station, it shows a level of cooperation between local authorities and a private business that should be encouraged.

So does the tessabaan have ANY local money available?

[da]

How about keeping the klongs in a good state of repair.

Klong Chonpratan is in need of work in many spots.

[bunthom]

1. Enforced traffic regulations relating to motorcyles
2. Completion of the road beside the railway track (currently blocked by squaters)
3. Guranteed supply of clean water
4. Drainage for floods
5. Obvious road works completed
6. New, properly equipped schools
7. Sufficient telephone lines
8. A thoughtful town plan (including zoning) with political nerve to implement without filling their own pockets
9. Honest police
10 A good local English newspaper (say, weekly)