I have been caught in 3 in Bangkok (2 going to the airport... why can't they just helicopter to the airport?), 1 at the airport in udon thani in which they closed the main highway for over an hour in waiting for the VIP. and 3 times in Pattaya in the same street light. The issue it seems is that it seems that due to inefficiency they tend to block significant amounts if not the whole route before commencing. I literally sat at the light in pattay for 20 minutes and the cops had already stopped the traffic when I got there.

Funny enough a young middle eastern foreigner on a scooter, after waiting 5 or so minutes with no motorcade in site (for another 15), decided he wanted to inch forward and I think wanted to uturn to take another route. the cop nearest him grabbed the bike from the front, and turned off his bike. then 15 minutes later, 3 normal looking midsized cars went through with 5 or 6 cop cars and a couple vans.

I think it could be a lot more efficient especially if the cops used more high powered street bikes and did the motorcades similar to how it is done in the US.

Consider that if politicians, up to and including the PM, were DENIED motorcades and had to sit in traffic like other Thais, there may be some impetus to improve the situation.

But I thought Thaksin solved this problem years ago?

He did.

Then he found out their was no money in it for him so he scrapped the whole thing.

As I recall, he ended up offering 100,000 baht "incentive" each month (couldn't have been his money as THAT has never been his style) to the Bangkok Police Precinct that had the "best" flow of traffic. And, as I also recall, each precinct took turns routing traffic through their neighboring precinct so as to share the booty each month. He had promised to end Bangkok's traffic woes within 6 months and of course, he didn't. But he was just practicing for much bigger things waaay back then. He was a clown then and not too much in the way of improvement since. Please correct me if I remember this incorrectly.

Edited October 30, 201213 yr by Dap

So they are saying only 60 people in Thailand will be truly qualified and instructed how to ride a motorbike.

http://gothailand.about.com/b/2009/08/28/motorbike-accidents-killed-hundreds-of-tourists-in-thailand-last-year.htm

And the Brits are obviously not very good at riding motorbikes in Thailand going by the hundreds of death every year

60? Yes sounds about right.

police escorts usually about 8 or 10 handed on motorbikes for tuk tuk farang tour groups in Chinag Mai is 1 of my particular favorites for a total waste of time and money.

Actually my gf works for a tour compnay and they often just hire a few cops to make a motorcade for them. This is for normal Thai travel not VIP's.

Considering that you can get a ticket for hogging the outside lane, to see convoys of dozens of buses in the outside lane in a line travelling in excess of the speed limit with a cop car front and back is the ultimate in basic law breaking actually being facilitated by the coppers.

...and usually on the way to the casinos over the border taking all those baht out of the country

IMHO motorcades are one of the few things the Thai police are good at (they are also pretty good at solving the cases they want to solve but there are too few of those). I suppose you could argue that there are too many motorcades, especially for some of the yellow cars, but in general they seem pretty professional about it. I get caught in traffic stoppages on the elevated motorway firly regularly but usually it is only for a few minutes and traffic flows nicely when it is done.

Hub of Motorcades

Pity they didn't give that basic training to the poor bugger who tried to stop a certain Ferrari.

This is an ignorant and incorrect statement. The killed police officer did not try to stop the Ferrari, he did not even see it as it crashed into his bike from behind at speed.

Some years ago somebody had the temerity to overtake a motorcade and all the cops were ordered by a Government minister to take driving lessons. There was a picture in the newspaper(?) that cannot be mentioned of the cops sitting in a classroom all holding steering wheels. What made it even more comic was they were holding the wheels is such a way as to ensure failure in the UK driving test.