PM misreported over 3-month solution to Bangkok traffic woes, says spokesman

[Jonathan Fairfield]

PM misreported over 3-month solution to Bangkok traffic woes, says spokesman

By The Nation

 

 

Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha had been misreported as having vowed to solve Bangkok’s traffic woes in three months, Government Spokesman Lt-General Sansern Kaewkamnerd said on Saturday.

The PM was just issuing an order to government agencies to come up with measures within three months to deal with road congestion, he said.

 

Sansern said Prayut did not mean that the city’s notorious traffic woes could be tackled in three months as reported.

 

There are several issues making up the traffic problem, Sansern said, including an inadequate city plan, the on-going construction of mass transit systems and the high number of vehicles and motorcycles at 9.7 million.

 

Sansern said the number of vehicles and motorcycles is eight times higher than can be properly accommodated on the available road space.

 

The spokesman said Prayut simply ordered related government agencies to within three months come up with measures to reduce traffic congestion as much as possible.

 

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/breakingnews/30352441

 

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2018-08-18

[worgeordie]

I believe, I remember Thaksin when he was in power said he could 

fix it within a month,so come on PM,get your finger out .

regards Worgeordie

[bluesofa]

1 minute ago, worgeordie said:

I believe, I remember Thaksin when he was in power said he could 

fix it within a month,so come on PM,get your finger out .

regards Worgeordie

He CAN do...Article 44: Ban all cars. Done.

Why are there so many disbelievers - apparently including the PM himself.

 

[janclaes47]

He couldn't even fix a simple issue like the overpriced lottery tickets, but he's gonna fix this mess hahahahahahahaha

[scorecard]

26 minutes ago, worgeordie said:

I believe, I remember Thaksin when he was in power said he could 

fix it within a month,so come on PM,get your finger out .

regards Worgeordie

 No he didn't say that, he said 6 months.

 

In reality at six months nothing much had improved and the task was quietly passed to someone else but nothing much has ever improved re Bkk traffic. 

 

 

Edited August 18, 2018 by scorecard

[Chang_paarp]

Ahh The back-pedalling begins. 

[billd766]

Did Prayuth Tweet this as fake news?

[yellowboat]

16 hours ago, billd766 said:

Did Prayuth Tweet this as fake news?

No it was just another in a series of big misunderstandings which are uniquely common to Thai juntas.  

 

Bangkok is full of dead ends as well.  Wonder of past juntas were responsible for such bad urban planning.  

 

So the answer is they need 8 times more road. 

 

Did they stop the BRT ?  Sounds like they cannot afford to stop any mass transit that is running. 

[Lupatria]

Why is it that most of the news regarding him start with the term mis...?

Misunderstood, misreported, misquoted. The only one missing is: misplaced.

[Wiggy]

Yet another annoying u-turn. 

[Srikcir]

22 hours ago, Jonathan Fairfield said:

The PM was just issuing an order to government agencies to come up with measures within three months to deal with road congestion

But those measures are apparently not expected to solve traffic problems.

22 hours ago, Jonathan Fairfield said:

Prayut did not mean that the city’s notorious traffic woes could be tackled in three months

So the agencies have been directed basically to produce nothing of consequence.

Kind of like Prayut's past four years of performance as PM.

[Thaidream]

Actually during the economic collapse of 1997- traffic improved considerably but it  was due to people not having money to purchase much of anything and therefore staying home or using public transport.   Once the economy improved- the madness returned.

 

The only way to begin to solve this is to build huge parking lots on the outskirts of Bangkok so people needing to enter the city for work park their vehicle and use public transport.  Another solution would be to only allow cars with even registration numbers  on one day and the odd numbers the other..  There is no more space to build  needed roads and now even the side Sois are jammed during commute time.

[Media1]

22 hours ago, janclaes47 said:

He couldn't even fix a simple issue like the overpriced lottery tickets, but he's gonna fix this mess hahahahahahahaha

Yeah and the government websites all work and immigration. Thailand 4 would have cured the traffic with road sensors like a real country. Instead you have dildo and dunno from Isan in hire costumes pressing buttons lol joke

[berybert]

He helped himself to power 4 years ago. So maybe he meant 4 years and 3 months.

[sammieuk1]

On the bright side no ones going to die in stationary traffic unless your in the back of an ambulance of course??

[Jonmarleesco]

23 hours ago, worgeordie said:

I believe, I remember Thaksin when he was in power said he could 

fix it within a month,so come on PM,get your finger out .

regards Worgeordie

I think he said six months, but certainly wouldn't swear to it. 

[stud858]

Get the Norwegian traffic flow engineers in. There is no shame in asking for help from outside countries.

[Srikcir]

Selective world ranking for cities in which to drive, based on kfzteile24’s data analysis, noting the congestion level and average speed from the airport to downtown for each: 

#1  Düsseldorf

#6  Singapore

#61 Sydney

#64 Kuala Lumpur

#82 Hong Kong

#85 Bangkok

#87 Jakarta

https://www.kfzteile24.de/best-and-worst-cities-to-drive-usd

[hotchilli]

2 hours ago, Thaidream said:

Actually during the economic collapse of 1997- traffic improved considerably but it  was due to people not having money to purchase much of anything and therefore staying home or using public transport.   Once the economy improved- the madness returned.

 

The only way to begin to solve this is to build huge parking lots on the outskirts of Bangkok so people needing to enter the city for work park their vehicle and use public transport.  Another solution would be to only allow cars with even registration numbers  on one day and the odd numbers the other..  There is no more space to build  needed roads and now even the side Sois are jammed during commute time.

Ban private cars in the centre of BKK from 07:00 to 19:00
only taxis and buses allowed.

[300sd]

Now he wants to fix the problem scientifically. That should take much longer, especially if he's involved!  

[connda]

"Ok - 'mon back prime minister, back'er on up now, keep it coming, almost got it. Great!"
***Reset!***
"Over the next three month we will have many (extravagant hosted luncheons), errr, brainstorming sessions to address the congestion problems of the city's plebeians who must actually drive themselves <shutter> 

Edited August 19, 2018 by connda

[jaiyen]

If there are 8 times the number of vehicles deemed appropiate in Bangkok,  why do they register about 500 new vehicles every week ?  Stop it !

[sawadeeken]

So......... Is this (Unelected/Criminal) PM the kind of guy that Thais want for 'long term'............

Any GUESS ????

[Retiredandhappyhere]

On 8/18/2018 at 5:32 PM, Chang_paarp said:

Ahh The back-pedalling begins. 

I guess it was just another "misunderstanding"?  This is one thing that Thailand really is the hub of......................misunderstandings.

[Redline]

On 8/18/2018 at 3:12 PM, bluesofa said:

He CAN do...Article 44: Ban all cars. Done.

Why are there so many disbelievers - apparently including the PM himself.

 

Rotate driving according to plate number.  Oh wait, if the solution comes down to enforcement-no luck here 

[mike324]

21 hours ago, Thaidream said:

The only way to begin to solve this is to build huge parking lots on the outskirts of Bangkok so people needing to enter the city for work park their vehicle and use public transport.  Another solution would be to only allow cars with even registration numbers  on one day and the odd numbers the other..  There is no more space to build  needed roads and now even the side Sois are jammed during commute time.

The real solution is to make bts and mrt cheaper. The owners of BTS are one of the riches families in Thailand. Most low-mid income can't afford to take the BTS, which is one of the big reasons for the amount of buses and trans province vans on the road. This will have the biggest impact.

I've noticed cars crossing saphan taksin has decrease quite a bit after the contruction of the bts route, but traffic is bad again due to the number of condos popping up on the thonburi side of the river.

 

Even / odd registration numbers don't work - many families have more than one car and they can easily get two license plates via other means to skirt this ban.

 

Another solution is to give tax deductions to move offices out of the city center.

 

Last but not least, there are not enough bridges crossing the river to assist with the flow of traffic, hence a main reason why there is traffic jams during rush hour, its all clogged at these bottleneck points.

[Srikcir]

10 minutes ago, mike324 said:

Another solution is to give tax deductions to move offices out of the city center.

The larger solution is to decentralize Bangkok as both a business and residential center.

But I suspect the continued centralization of Bangkok is due in part to politics (Bangkok city has been largely pro-military) and the military's proximity to control most of the nation's government offices in case of "national emergency."

[mike324]

4 hours ago, Srikcir said:

The larger solution is to decentralize Bangkok as both a business and residential center.

But I suspect the continued centralization of Bangkok is due in part to politics (Bangkok city has been largely pro-military) and the military's proximity to control most of the nation's government offices in case of "national emergency."

thats a lot of nonsense......they did move some of the government offices to Nonthaburi to decentralize

 

When Thaksin was in power, he had 49% of the Bangkok votes. If he wasn't kick of the country, he could easily have achieve 50% in following years. Back to the topic....

Edited August 20, 2018 by mike324