Phuket Opinion: The toll of tourism

[Lite Beer]

Phuket Opinion: The toll of tourism
Phuket Gazette -

Sometimes making your own decision provides the best results. Image: Gazette Graphics

PHUKET: As we embark on the year 2014, there seems to be no better time to reflect on the monumental changes that have transformed Phuket over the past few decades, all the result of “Bangkok style” urbanization that continues to degrade what is left of the island’s natural beauty and diminish its appeal to foreign tourists.

In a recent Phuket Gazette online readers’ poll, only about six per cent of those who took part thought that the island’s beaches remained its premier selling point. This was the least popular among six possible responses (click here).

The most popular response was that the island’s unique combination of beaches, natural beauty, good value for money and nightlife was responsible for keeping tourist arrival figures on the rise year-in and year-out. Good enough, at least if one is prepared to accept tourism arrival figures as the gold standard by which success should be measured.

The sad fact is that it is far too late to turn back the clock and restore the island to what it once was: a tropical paradise with hillsides covered in virgin forest, beautiful coral reefs within easy swimming distance of most beaches, crystal clear waters and a friendly, laid-back local population for whom world-class hospitality came as second nature.

The problem, of course, has been the island’s so-called “development”, a term that comes across as increasingly oxymoronic as we watch Phuket’s natural heritage plundered and replaced with an unsightly urban landscape more like images from the dystopian sci-fi film Blade Runner than those which appear on so many tourism promotion pamphlets.

This development has brought us endless traffic tailbacks, slum communities built on cleared mangrove forests, huge advertising billboards, and the latest trend: colossal concrete traffic underpasses that may have no appreciable effect on the ever-growing traffic problem, except to transform the existing mess into a three-dimensional nightmare à la Bangkok and line the pockets of corrupt politicians.

It is hard to conceive of a way to stem this heartbreaking tide under the existing vassal state dynamic, with the island’s development funded, authorized and approved by powerful people in the capital who have apparently spent too much time zoning out while sitting in traffic jams to conceive that there could be a better way forward.

One potential way out would be to establish the island as a special administrative area with its own elected governor, a concept that has long been discussed. But that would require honest politicians, which are as few on the ground here as they are in the capital.

Source: http://www.phuketgazette.net/phuket_news/2014/Phuket-Opinion-The-toll-of-tourism-23160.html

-- Phuket Gazette 2014-01-05

[chooka]

The place is far from a tropical paradise. It is a sewer that has been abused with no management. The place is filthy this includes the streets and the beaches.

[Jimi007]

The writer pretty well sums up the state of affairs in Phuket, unfortunately…

[Fookhaht]

The place is far from a tropical paradise. It is a sewer that has been abused with no management. The place is filthy this includes the streets and the beaches.

And the rapacious tuk-tuk/taxi/jet ski mafia have helped to put the final nails into the coffin.

Phuket has become Thailand's second most-disgusting tourist destination after Pattaya.

Edited January 5, 2014 by Fookhaht

[LivinginKata]

The writer pretty well sums up the state of affairs in Phuket, unfortunately

Yes, well written and concise.

[jpeg]

The writer pretty well sums up the state of affairs in Phuket, unfortunately

Yes, well written and concise.

From a rag which has consistently, if not exclusively, promoted it's buddies in the real estate sector. Hypocrites

[Alwyn]

The place is far from a tropical paradise. It is a sewer that has been abused with no management. The place is filthy this includes the streets and the beaches.

I've just returned home from Layan beach. It was faultless, clean and white and no sewerage to be seen. Which beaches are you talking about? I've lived here for 12 years and the beaches seem okay to me. If you think the street are filthy, try the Philipinnes some time

[Alwyn]

The place is far from a tropical paradise. It is a sewer that has been abused with no management. The place is filthy this includes the streets and the beaches.

And the rapacious tuk-tuk/taxi/jet ski mafia have helped to put the final nails into the coffin.

Phuket has become Thailand's second most-disgusting tourist destination after Pattaya.

and yet Phuket is still the number one holiday destination in SE Asia

[JulesMad]

The place is far from a tropical paradise. It is a sewer that has been abused with no management. The place is filthy this includes the streets and the beaches.

And the rapacious tuk-tuk/taxi/jet ski mafia have helped to put the final nails into the coffin.

Phuket has become Thailand's second most-disgusting tourist destination after Pattaya.

IMHO, Phuket has overtaken Pattaya by miles

[LeeThayer]

The place is far from a tropical paradise. It is a sewer that has been abused with no management. The place is filthy this includes the streets and the beaches.

I've just returned home from Layan beach. It was faultless, clean and white and no sewerage to be seen. Which beaches are you talking about? I've lived here for 12 years and the beaches seem okay to me. If you think the street are filthy, try the Philipinnes some time

Layan Beach, lets see, wasn't that were a backhoe burried a bunch of trash the village did not want to seem to remove, on the beach??? Maybe you missed the video of that. Faultless, clean, and white? And no sewage to be seen? Is this something (sewage) you have to look for everyday? Well, maybe you were standing on the sand and just didn't dig into, just a thought.

Comparing the streets being filthy to anywhere else is pointless. It is advertised as a beach resort area, not as "our beach is cleaner than Karachi, Pakistan (I have been there as well).

[Alwyn]

The place is far from a tropical paradise. It is a sewer that has been abused with no management. The place is filthy this includes the streets and the beaches.

I've just returned home from Layan beach. It was faultless, clean and white and no sewerage to be seen. Which beaches are you talking about? I've lived here for 12 years and the beaches seem okay to me. If you think the street are filthy, try the Philipinnes some time

Layan Beach, lets see, wasn't that were a backhoe burried a bunch of trash the village did not want to seem to remove, on the beach??? Maybe you missed the video of that. Faultless, clean, and white? And no sewage to be seen? Is this something (sewage) you have to look for everyday? Well, maybe you were standing on the sand and just didn't dig into, just a thought.

Comparing the streets being filthy to anywhere else is pointless. It is advertised as a beach resort area, not as "our beach is cleaner than Karachi, Pakistan (I have been there as well).

You'd be better off back in Pakistan. So would Thailand

[Ulic]

As far as I am concerned there are only two main problems. Clean up the sewers that dump raw sewage into the

rivers, creeks and oceans. Stop the littering and dumping of garbage on the streets and empty lots. Employ

staff to clean the beaches starting at 6am. Pay for it with money from the ubiquitous beach chair rental outfits.

The Mafia Taxi and TukTuk operators are another matter entirely. Love to get rid of them as well and install a baht

bus route system but that is just a pipe dream.

[chooka]

As far as I am concerned there are only two main problems. Clean up the sewers that dump raw sewage into the

rivers, creeks and oceans. Stop the littering and dumping of garbage on the streets and empty lots. Employ

staff to clean the beaches starting at 6am. Pay for it with money from the ubiquitous beach chair rental outfits.

The Mafia Taxi and TukTuk operators are another matter entirely. Love to get rid of them as well and install a baht

bus route system but that is just a pipe dream.

I have to agree with you.

Phuket is what Thailand promotes as their jewel in the crown of the country but it is sinking fast down the toilet.

There is to much corruption, to many people living for now and trying to make a fast dollar and absolutely no management of the resources. Absolutely no thought for tomorrow. The place will be a dried up barren wasteland in a few years. When I 1st went to Phuket 30 yrs ago as an 18 yr old it was beautiful and yes you could say it was a paradise island.

I am sure as ASEAN opens up places like Mayamar / Burma will have learnt a lot of lessons from Thailand and will leave them in their wake. Burma is untapped as far as tourism goes and if they play it right and put in excellent management practices then Thailand is doomed when it comes to tourism.

[jackh]

I agree with the OP. however he was a bit too kind with his assessment.

I stopped my regular visits to Pheuket 3 years ago. THEN it already had sunk to the point of a non-habitable "paradise" island.

It should be stated that cosmetically, it is now a stinkhole, unworthy of a label that has anything to do with the words paradise, beautiful, amazing, value, etc. Most importantly is the danger you place your family in dragging them to Phuket in the first place. This is the real tragedy about Phuket. It simply is a place of great danger and lawlessness.

Stay away................stay FAR away.

[Hugh Geen]

Words like "sewer" and "disgusting" are over the top. Yes there are traffic problems as there are in many other places in the world. Yes it would be great if there was less litter / trash on the roads and beaches - (I saw a class of Thai school kids picking up litter in the road the other day) - I blame locals and farang for this. Yes there are horrible, unsightly buildings going up everywhere - as there are everywhere else in the world. But when I drive around the island and compare it to south-east England - I stilI like Phuket much more.

[JetsetBkk]

Layan Beach, lets see, wasn't that were a backhoe burried a bunch of trash the village did not want to seem to remove, on the beach??? Maybe you missed the video of that.

<snip>

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6G_AFVZsEw

[Fookhaht]

The place is far from a tropical paradise. It is a sewer that has been abused with no management. The place is filthy this includes the streets and the beaches.

And the rapacious tuk-tuk/taxi/jet ski mafia have helped to put the final nails into the coffin.

Phuket has become Thailand's second most-disgusting tourist destination after Pattaya.

and yet Phuket is still the number one holiday destination in SE Asia

First-timers suckered into the Pukhet trap by money-grubbing tour operators from their home countries.

Sent from my tin can via string

[eezergood]

Reap what you sow