TOP SECRET: routes/times for air-con 15 baht local bus service!

[uptheos]

"it's our only hope in the never-ending battle with surly, greedy red-taxi (รถสองแถว rót-sɔ̌ɔng-tɛ̌ɛo) drivers"

I've never had a 'never ending battle' in 25 years, usually trips are quite seamless and I don't foresee any battles either..

But good work OP, hope many take advantage of your project.

[Chris Pirazzi]

FYI still working on a solution to edit the OP but will update the map as soon as I can.

[Konini]

I availed myself of said bus service today for the first time, more out of curiosity than anything else to see if he would open the door and let me on not at an official stop (he was in non moving traffic) and if he would drop me off where I wanted. Yes and Yes. Few seats, fewer taken (although there were 6 of us) air con and a ticket seller's salary to pay I did not understand though. Not for 15 baht per person. I fear that this may not last a long time due to economic reasons but give it 5 stars for comfort and I really hope it works out for them.

[MadMac]

Sounds like fun, if I'd be a backpacker, perfectly fine. Thanks for the headsup. If more people would know and more people will use it, perhaps one day there will be a bus system.

They just added a funny tourist transport to Ban Tawai and that to the new "outlet" at Kad Farang. Both completely useless. If they cease operation perhaps they could drive around the city.

[kanook]

I've often seen the bus stop signs. I've never seen the bus, nor spoken to anyone who's ridden on one. Are you sure they really travel the streets?

I see them regularly driving on Tung Hotel Rd and a section of Charoen Muang Rd.

[orang37]

They just added a funny tourist transport to Ban Tawai and that to the new "outlet" at Kad Farang.

Details, please.

thanks, ~o:37;

[Tywais]

FYI still working on a solution to edit the OP but will update the map as soon as I can.

I have updated the OP by request allowing for off-site changes he can make.

Link to his dynamic site here - Click here for latest route/time info for the Chiang Mai air-con local bus!

[Chicog]

Isn't that a bit of a vicious circle?

They aren't reliable and change their routes and times, so people don't trust or use them.

And because people don't trust or use them, they keep changing their routes and times.

Never going to work unless they offer a reliable service, which can then be publicised, which may then encourage passengers, which might then encourage them to promote it.

[northernjohn]

FYI still working on a solution to edit the OP but will update the map as soon as I can.

I have updated the OP by request allowing for off-site changes he can make.

Link to his dynamic site here - Click here for latest route/time info for the Chiang Mai air-con local bus!

Tywais thanks for the link.

Based on the information there I would never plan on using it. As the bulk of the letter says it might already have changed. I suppose you might call them if you speak Thai.

[MadMac]

They just added a funny tourist transport to Ban Tawai and that to the new "outlet" at Kad Farang.

Details, please.

thanks, ~o:37;

The Baan Tawai Minivan is called BTTS, you see them regularly on Hang Dong Road. Don't really know from exactly where to where. Some info on the bottom of this site: http://www.ban-tawai.com/news.php

For the Kad Farang shuttle I don't know, probably from some hotels with potential victims for the outlet center ...

[Asiantravel]

Isn't that a bit of a vicious circle?

They aren't reliable and change their routes and times, so people don't trust or use them.

And because people don't trust or use them, they keep changing their routes and times.

Never going to work unless they offer a reliable service, which can then be publicised, which may then encourage passengers, which might then encourage them to promote it.

no they dont change their routes and the service to the airport is frequent and reliable

[WinnieTheKhwai]

I have updated the OP by request allowing for off-site changes he can make.

Link to his dynamic site here - Click here for latest route/time info for the Chiang Mai air-con local bus!

Huh..?

[TheAppletons]

I have updated the OP by request allowing for off-site changes he can make.

Link to his dynamic site here - Click here for latest route/time info for the Chiang Mai air-con local bus!

Huh..?

You mean you don't want to click to support his website by using your credit card or PayPal?

[WinnieTheKhwai]

^ Nah, that's too common a misconception on the Internet to get worked up about, that people will pay for information. It's kind of cute.

I've read it again and I think I get it now.

("allowing off-site changes via his dynamic site" threw me a little. It apparently just means the OP was updated to include a link. )

[Konini]

I have updated the OP by request allowing for off-site changes he can make.

Link to his dynamic site here - Click here for latest route/time info for the Chiang Mai air-con local bus!

Huh..?

You mean you don't want to click to support his website by using your credit card or PayPal?

When people do something, putting in a lot of effort for free, that benefits us, I don't find it unreasonable for said person to request donations. There's no paywall or obligation.

I have no affiliation or knowledge of this person apart from clicking on the link and reading the page. I never buy big name software or apps but regularly send $5 or $10 to some internet stranger who has developed an app or utility for PC's or provides a good site with public information or a forum that I often use and benefit from. Thai Visa pays for itself (and of course makes a profit) from advertising, but many smaller sites don't until they eventually develop and have a user base big enough to be profitable from advertising. Extensions\Addons like Adblock, FlashControl, Checker Plus for Gmail and Reddit Enhancement Suite are things I use daily, some of them from the time I turn the laptop or computer on until I shut down and I really don't mind flicking a small contribution to them by either donation or buying the pro version, which is often not much different from the free version. A couple I've done twice because they're used on the laptop and the PC.

I've been doing it since the very early days of BBS when some kid in his bedroom had given me something that would save me a lot of time by automating a task or had come up with some ingenious shortcut way of doing something that I wouldn't have thought about, and I used to be quite heavily involved in the Open Source community submitting my little automations and shortcuts - never asked for money, I was being paid handsomely because very few people could write Unix code back then and I was happy to share what tips and tricks I'd found with anyone interested. The reason I would sent money - and it was really hard in the early days, I'd have to make contact to make sure the street address if listed was still current, go to the bank and get an international cheque in US$ or German Marks and mail it to them or do a wire transfer, whichever was cheapest.

The reason I did this was to encourage the people doing it to keep at it. One of the people I sent money to could have grown up to be the one who founded Google or Facebook or Twitter. Sure, they are raking it in now, but back then it was my contribution to the community of programmers who would make life what it is today. Imagine life without Google? They do everything from a massive chunk of the email address in the world at the moment and developing driverless cars and a lot of other things in between. If they hadn't had the encouragement at a young age, and the money is nothing, it's the recognition that they are doing something good that people like, perhaps they would have given up and done a degree in engineering or chemistry.

Repeat; No affiliation to whoever runs this site. Just my humble opinion.

[Tywais]

("allowing off-site changes via his dynamic site" threw me a little. It apparently just means the OP was updated to include a link. )

It means the OP can edit it when needed to update whereas he can't here. Dynamic from the dictionary "2. Characterized by continuous change, activity, or progress:"

[Chris Pirazzi]

Isn't that a bit of a vicious circle?

They aren't reliable and change their routes and times, so people don't trust or use them.

And because people don't trust or use them, they keep changing their routes and times.

Never going to work unless they offer a reliable service, which can then be publicised, which may then encourage passengers, which might then encourage them to promote it

I definitely agree that there is a vicious cycle going on, though I think the reason they change their routes is simply that the têet-sà~baan suddenly yanks funding from the whole project, forcing the bus folks to remove routes until there are only 1 or 2 routes left. Then something happens, they get funding from the têet-sà~baan again, and then they expand routes again. I have seen this cycle play out at least twice in 10+ years. When the bus company changes their routes, I don't think it's part of an intentional, proactive effort to hunt out the optimal route in terms of ridership (e.g. they don't change from 8 routes to 8 different routes---they either expand or shrink routes). I think it's simply a forced reaction to a loss or gain of funding.

Fortunately I think that the routes have been fairly stable over the last few months.

The question is why is there a loss or gain of funding? Logically you would think that the loss of funding is due to low ridership. But TIT and that kind of logical thinking is not typically valid. Instead, I suspect the loss and gain in funding might be coming from some kind of internal political squabble that is only loosely connected with ridership levels. Occasionally I have seen some Thai-language advertising for the bus service that mentions Chiang Mai academics and their papers and studies about how to maximally replace private cars with public transit users, which is cool. But that leads me to the cynical thought that perhaps different waves of têet-sà~baan politicians (who may not actually care about public transit) are humping the funding that comes with the academic cachet. But that's just a guess.

My goal in spending hours gathering the info in the OP is to help break this cycle by providing a boost to ridership. Currently, most of the passengers seem to be Thai school kids. By translating the schedules into English and contacting the bus company periodically to keep the schedules up to date, I hope we can add on top of that a big group of regular farang riders. Even if the survival of the service is only loosely connected with ridership (as I speculate above), it can't hurt (well, unless some politician sets up a scheme to short the bus service, but now we're really in conspiracy land ).

Another piece of good news is that the bus company says they are awaiting the printing of all-new bilingual posters and fliers with the latest schedule. I haven't seen them yet though, nor do I know how and how widely they will distribute the posters and fliers.

Of course, during this whole 10-year process, despite the change in routes, the company has left up all their old signage and bus stop signs/schedules, virtually guaranteeing that most people who see and believe the posted signs will be angry and disappointed by the service. That's a big problem but not one we can solve with a ThaiVisa post, except to warn everyone not to believe the posted signs .

[siam2007]

great Job ! BOOKMARKED !

as it happens, I will spend some time in CM again in June after I haven't been there since 2012, and hopefully can use the service departing from the airport

[Asiantravel]

great Job ! BOOKMARKED !

as it happens, I will spend some time in CM again in June after I haven't been there since 2012, and hopefully can use the service departing from the airport

just a small word of advice regarding flagging it down

the bus seems to zip through the airport almost as if the driver doesn't expect to pick anyone up and you might well find there are no other passengers.

while you are sitting outside the arrivals hall waiting for it, you will see the bus enter the airport on the opposite side of the car park and then go around the loop past the international arrivals hall and then domestic.

when you see it approaching you have to be poised to almost stand in the road and wave vigourously because the driver doesn't seem to stop otherwise. But when you catch it you will find it's a speedy little vehicle

[uptheos]

great Job ! BOOKMARKED !

as it happens, I will spend some time in CM again in June after I haven't been there since 2012, and hopefully can use the service departing from the airport

just a small word of advice regarding flagging it down

the bus seems to zip through the airport almost as if the driver doesn't expect to pick anyone up and you might well find there are no other passengers.

while you are sitting outside the arrivals hall waiting for it, you will see the bus enter the airport on the opposite side of the car park and then go around the loop past the international arrivals hall and then domestic.

when you see it approaching you have to be poised to almost stand in the road and wave vigourously because the driver doesn't seem to stop otherwise. But when you catch it you will find it's a speedy little vehicle

All that nonsense when you can get an air con cab for 160 baht?

[Chris Pirazzi]

great Job ! BOOKMARKED !

as it happens, I will spend some time in CM again in June after I haven't been there since 2012, and hopefully can use the service departing from the airport

just a small word of advice regarding flagging it down

the bus seems to zip through the airport almost as if the driver doesn't expect to pick anyone up and you might well find there are no other passengers.

while you are sitting outside the arrivals hall waiting for it, you will see the bus enter the airport on the opposite side of the car park and then go around the loop past the international arrivals hall and then domestic.

when you see it approaching you have to be poised to almost stand in the road and wave vigourously because the driver doesn't seem to stop otherwise. But when you catch it you will find it's a speedy little vehicle

Cool thanks. I just added that to the link.

15B vs. 160B may be worth a little hand waving!

[Konini]

great Job ! BOOKMARKED !

as it happens, I will spend some time in CM again in June after I haven't been there since 2012, and hopefully can use the service departing from the airport

just a small word of advice regarding flagging it down

the bus seems to zip through the airport almost as if the driver doesn't expect to pick anyone up and you might well find there are no other passengers.

while you are sitting outside the arrivals hall waiting for it, you will see the bus enter the airport on the opposite side of the car park and then go around the loop past the international arrivals hall and then domestic.

Funny you should say that. I watched it do the same thing at Arcade. I wasn't planning on jumping on, was happy to walk as it wasn't too hot at the time and was just thinking it would be a good opportunity to see where he stops once I'd spotted him Joke was on him though as I caught him up by foot when he was stuck in traffic, but no probs with him letting me on or dropping me right at the lights at the bottom of the bridge - I was prepared to walk further and have him stop just before the little strip of shops but he must have assumed where I was going and as the lights were changing to red, went right up to them. I also noted that he wasn't making any attempt to slow down when approaching bus stops - I think all of them have the row of 6 or 8 seats built into the middle of the pavement so you have to step off the curb and walk on the road at some of them instead of using brains and putting them at the back.

If I were a cynical type, I'd say t's almost as if they DON'T want the service to survive.

[Asiantravel]

great Job ! BOOKMARKED !

as it happens, I will spend some time in CM again in June after I haven't been there since 2012, and hopefully can use the service departing from the airport

just a small word of advice regarding flagging it down

the bus seems to zip through the airport almost as if the driver doesn't expect to pick anyone up and you might well find there are no other passengers.

while you are sitting outside the arrivals hall waiting for it, you will see the bus enter the airport on the opposite side of the car park and then go around the loop past the international arrivals hall and then domestic.

Funny you should say that. I watched it do the same thing at Arcade. I wasn't planning on jumping on, was happy to walk as it wasn't too hot at the time and was just thinking it would be a good opportunity to see where he stops once I'd spotted him Joke was on him though as I caught him up by foot when he was stuck in traffic, but no probs with him letting me on or dropping me right at the lights at the bottom of the bridge - I was prepared to walk further and have him stop just before the little strip of shops but he must have assumed where I was going and as the lights were changing to red, went right up to them. I also noted that he wasn't making any attempt to slow down when approaching bus stops - I think all of them have the row of 6 or 8 seats built into the middle of the pavement so you have to step off the curb and walk on the road at some of them instead of using brains and putting them at the back.

If I were a cynical type, I'd say t's almost as if they DON'T want the service to survive.

" If I were a cynical type, I'd say t's almost as if they DON'T want the service to survive "

I'm not sure about that. I personally think it's just because they have been servicing this route every 40 minutes for so long now without many or in some cases ANY passengers joining them at the airport that they probably think no one is interested. They don't seem to appreciate that many people could be interested if only they knew how great this little bus is.

anyway those of us who appreciate a service like this must patronise this bus sufficiently to ensure it does survive.

Edited April 12, 2016 by Asiantravel

[uptheos]

great Job ! BOOKMARKED !

as it happens, I will spend some time in CM again in June after I haven't been there since 2012, and hopefully can use the service departing from the airport

just a small word of advice regarding flagging it down

the bus seems to zip through the airport almost as if the driver doesn't expect to pick anyone up and you might well find there are no other passengers.

while you are sitting outside the arrivals hall waiting for it, you will see the bus enter the airport on the opposite side of the car park and then go around the loop past the international arrivals hall and then domestic.

when you see it approaching you have to be poised to almost stand in the road and wave vigourously because the driver doesn't seem to stop otherwise. But when you catch it you will find it's a speedy little vehicle

Cool thanks. I just added that to the link.

15B vs. 160B may be worth a little hand waving!

160 Baht for Air Con cab. with driver who helps with your luggage, which can be a bonus if its heavy. It takes you right to your doorstep and TBH I think the 160 baht is cheap. I wonder how close to your doorstep a bus stops, probably not near 99.9% of people's home. And after all how many time do people use the airport?

[Konini]

160 Baht for Air Con cab. with driver who helps with your luggage, which can be a bonus if its heavy. It takes you right to your doorstep and TBH I think the 160 baht is cheap. I wonder how close to your doorstep a bus stops, probably not near 99.9% of people's home. And after all how many time do people use the airport?

Last month we arrived late and thought we may have trouble getting a songtoaw so I went to the counter, 250 baht to Rimping condo. All counters the same. Went outside got a TukTuk down from 200 to 100. We have taken taxi's many times, it used to be 140 to town and 160 to here, then 180 and now they were asking 250. Didn't really look but I think 180 into town. I'm glad I know about this bus now -drops us off maybe 30 meters from the door so we'll be looking for it first then songtoaw or tuktuk.

(Side note; a lot (not all) of the drivers help us with 3 heavy cases and heavy hand luggage when we come back from UK or Aus. Often, if they're not a grumpy old bugger I'll ask them to stop at a 7/11 or Tesco Express so I can get milk - if I do I'm straight in and out and I will buy him some munchies for his inconvenience)

[Mapguy]

Check out an Apple app "CMTRANSIT." You'll be very pleasantly surprised. Certainly there is an Android equivalent.

[hyperdimension]

Check out an Apple app "CMTRANSIT." You'll be very pleasantly surprised. Certainly there is an Android equivalent.

That is a different system and is discussed in this thread: What is the story with chiangmaibus.org ?

The bus stop signs shown on Chris Pirazzi's web site are for that system ("CM TRANSIT", chiangmaibus.org, Chiangmaibus Facebook page), not this air-conditioned mini van service. Chris has incorrectly referred to them as "old signs" of this air-conditioned mini van service.

Edited April 22, 2016 by hyperdimension

[Chris Pirazzi]

Check out an Apple app "CMTRANSIT." You'll be very pleasantly surprised. Certainly there is an Android equivalent.

That is a different system and is discussed in this thread: What is the story with chiangmaibus.org ?

The bus stop signs shown on Chris Pirazzi's web site are for that system ("CM TRANSIT", chiangmaibus.org, Chiangmaibus Facebook page), not this air-conditioned mini van service. Chris has incorrectly referred to them as "old signs" of this air-conditioned mini van service.

Thanks! It's a really good idea to clarify the similarities and differences between the aircon bus system and the fixed-price, fixed-route non-air-con red-taxi system.

Even the NAME of the systems---"Chiangmaibus"---is a source of confusion.

You are correct that the pictured bus stop sign does not talk about the aircon buses, but it turns out most of the aircon bus stops look like this. More on this below.

First let me try and reduce confusion by laying out everything we know now:

There are at least two and possibly four types of vehicles offering fixed-route, fixed-price service in Chiang Mai, all under the banner of "Chiangmaibus"

• The aircon half-buses (aka minibuses, NOT minivans) described in this ThaiVisa thread you are reading now (http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/907628-top-secret-routestimes-for-air-con-15-baht-local-bus-service/) and whose up-to-date route and times are shown at at http://slice-of-thai.com/cmbus/ , currently consisting of route B1 (Arcade-Zoo) and B2 (Arcade-Airport). Many (not all) of these buses have chaingmaibus dot org (do not go here: viruses!) prominently printed on them, but at this time that website contains no information about the aircon buses (clearly they want it to someday though). The Thai-language Chiangmaibus Facebook Page also has a few mentions of the aircon bus service, but the Facebook page mostly talks about the next type of vehicle....

• A separate system of non-air-con pickup-truck red-taxis that have fixed routes and fixed prices. The routes are named with just numbers like 2, 6, or 12 and you can often find maps showing as many as 12 routes, although in a recent Facebook post it seems they might switch some/all of the red-taxi routes to a naming scheme starting wtih R (R1 R2 R3) also using the name "Chiang Mai City Hop." As with the aircon buses, red-taxi routes and times change randomly with no advance notice. These vehicles also have chiangmaibus dot org (do not go here: viruses!) printed on them and that website contains (probably outdated) info on the red-taxi routes. The Thai-language Chiangmaibus Facebook Page mostly discusses the red-taxis, including schedule and route changes. I do not know any current, authoritative source of routes and times for this service, but it seems the Facebook page might be the most current. There is a different thread on ThaiVisa.com which discusses these red-taxis (but don't be confused by the name of the thread: red-taxis are only part of "Chiangmaibus"). Then there is also the CMTRANSIT smartphone app (see below).

• A recent Facebook post mentions that the "Chiangmaibus" service also includes minivans (aka tourist "Shuttle buses") to Ban Tawai woodworking village. It seems reasonable to expect more minivan-based routes in the future.

• That same Facebook post also mentions new, "cute, green" tourist trams (รถราง), also under the "Chiangmaibus" logo, which will take tourists around the old city. Has anyone seen these?

Some folks have pointed out that some of the maps and fliers for various services above have the website http://www.cmcity.go.th printed on them. This is simply the website of the Chiang Mai Municipality (the têet-sà~baan) and is not transport-specific. I have not yet been able to find any route/time info about transport on this website, but if anyone does please let me know.

There is a smartphone app for Android and a smartphone app for iOS/iPhone/iPad called CMTRANSIT which is supposed to show you, in real-time, the position of every fixed-route red taxi on a real-time map. This is a very cool idea because it gives you much more confidence about whether the taxi will really come and slightly lessens your need to know the schedules (so it's a clever technological workaround for whatever intractable management problem plagues these transport systems). Currently this app does NOT show you the location of the aircon buses, minivans, or trams, but that seems to be a goal since all these forms of transport are co-branded. These apps seem to be the result of some kind of joint academic-government effort in Chiang Mai. BUT unfortunately many of the reviews indicate that the apps (or the data the apps depend on) is flaky and often the little red-taxis are just stuck on the map. So I am not sure how much use the app is. Does anyone use one of these apps regularly?

So, getting back to the picture of the bus stop: you are correct that the bus stop sign in the picture you quoted (the same picture on my website) shows routes/times for two lines in the the fixed-price, fixed-route non-air-con red-taxi system and does not describe routes/times for the aircon bus. But it turns out that, again because of the never-ending musical-chairs game of bus and red-taxi route/time changes, MOST of the stops where the aircon bus currently stops are actually labeled only with red-taxi route signs (and they may, or may not, actually be red taxi stops)! The stop shown in the picture is actually an aircon bus stop even though it says it is a red-taxi stop, and there is no aircon-related sign at that stop. Yes, it's crazy. So potential riders are most likely to see a sign like this.

I just updated my site with all these new clarifications. Thanks for bringing it up!

http://slice-of-thai.com/cmbus/

[Konini]

Thanks for the update Chris.

Call me sceptical, but it appears to me that they want it to fail. Or somebody wants it to fail.

Why not more (any) info in English. It's crazy.

[Chris Pirazzi]

Thanks for the update Chris.

Call me sceptical, but it appears to me that they want it to fail. Or somebody wants it to fail.

Yes, agreed. Though I have no evidence, I cynically suspect the bus service is a football in some kind of local political turf war in which each contender is just trying to get budget or grow their empire and doesn't actually care whether the service is good or not.