News Forum - Phuket officials swoop on encroaching beach beds, umbrellas, and restaurants

[Thaiger]

Phuket officials swooped on encroaching beach beds, umbrellas, and restaurants on a beach in the Thalang district yesterday. A team of officials led by Thalang District Chief Bancha Tanuin inspected Lay Phang Beach in Cherng Talay. The officials asked operators to remove beach beds and umbrellas from the beach. Even though many tourists enjoy these …

The story Phuket officials swoop on encroaching beach beds, umbrellas, and restaurants as seen on Thaiger News.

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[RNikoley]

I understand how it can get out of hand, but generally, I never see that. What I most often see is something really charming that most of us enjoy. So long as there's plenty of area between the chairs, umbrellas, and tables...and the water...no problem for me.

On the other hand, the crap on the roadways I observe every day and hear all evening with the unbelievably loud motorcycles? That's another story, but for some reason, there appears to be no interest or motivation in enforcing a little common courtesy and civil decency on that front.

Maybe it's because so many of the vehicular offenders are just average folk, while the beach "offenders" are mom & pop entrepreneurs with at least a little bit of money.

[Honesto]

Wake up everyone in Authority !

Phuket is in the tourist industry. I have been coming here for 36 years, initially for holidays and then to live.

Whilst I would prefer it to be the island paradise of old, those days are over. I understand what tourists like and should have to make their holidays enjoyable and memorable.

All this nonsense about public land, especially concerning beach facilities is ridiculous, Phuket is in the mass tourism industry. One does not have to destroy the natural beauty by having non permanent structures on the beaches.

The classic disaster was at Surin Beach, where there were some excellent clean, sanitary well run restaurants/beach clubs with immaculate sunbeds with canopies beachside of the road. This is what many tourists expect and are prepared to pay a little extra for.

Instead of the local government tearing them down, they should have granted annual leases to the owners to operate those illegally built premises and gained huge revenue which could have been spent on overseeing water sports operations, beach cleaning etc.

If you go to Surin Beach now it's a disaster, overrun with salengs, poor eating facilities with old and tatty umbrellas.

The TAT or Phuket governor should tell these local morons to learn from their mistakes.

[RNikoley]

1 hour ago, Honesto said:

Wake up everyone in Authority !

Phuket is in the tourist industry. I have been coming here for 36 years, initially for holidays and then to live.

Whilst I would prefer it to be the island paradise of old, those days are over. I understand what tourists like and should have to make their holidays enjoyable and memorable.

All this nonsense about public land, especially concerning beach facilities is ridiculous, Phuket is in the mass tourism industry. One does not have to destroy the natural beauty by having non permanent structures on the beaches.

The classic disaster was at Surin Beach, where there were some excellent clean, sanitary well run restaurants/beach clubs with immaculate sunbeds with canopies beachside of the road. This is what many tourists expect and are prepared to pay a little extra for.

Instead of the local government tearing them down, they should have granted annual leases to the owners to operate those illegally built premises and gained huge revenue which could have been spent on overseeing water sports operations, beach cleaning etc.

If you go to Surin Beach now it's a disaster, overrun with salengs, poor eating facilities with old and tatty umbrellas.

The TAT or Phuket governor should tell these local morons to learn from their mistakes.

"The classic disaster was at Surin Beach, where there were some excellent clean, sanitary well run restaurants/beach clubs with immaculate sunbeds with canopies beachside of the road. This is what many tourists expect and are prepared to pay a little extra for."

In a past life, I lived in Toulon, France for a couple of years and anyone who's ever spent much time in the Riviera has seen it done right (as well as in Spain, Italy, and any number of other places bordering the Med) and it's DELIGHTFUL.

Really, the coolest thing ever.

Before that, I lived in Japan for 5 years, on Sagami Bay, south of Tokyo and Yokohama. Every beach had the seasonal temporary structures. Beach bar/restaurant, one right after the other. Food stands galore. Also, DELIGHTFUL.

Blows my mind.

... Another one...

I came to Thailand a lot in the late 80s (when I lived in Japan), Pattaya mostly, and during the days, we'd often hop on the motorbikes and drive out to Jomtien. I can't recall there being anything much on the other side of the road but jungle. All the stuff, the quaint little beach bars, were all on the sand.

It was terrific.

Here I am 35 years later, and I live in Pratamnak, Jomtien, but I rarely go down to the beach. I go to a couple other places I know where I can at least sit in a restaurant that, if not right on the sand, at least butts up against it.

Edited April 1, 2023 by RNikoley

[Mandy]

How dare tourists enjoy it!!!! Let's knock it down.

[Ramanathan.P]

So...what is the fate of all the swooped items? Kept in custody until a penalty is paid and returned back to owners or destroy them in public so that no one dare to do it again? Any illegal structure has to be ripped down immediately and destroyed. That should be the way to prevent any further illegal structures being erected in future. 

[Grumpish]

Surely some system of licencing would be better than outright bans? Yes, empty tropical beaches can be great, but a cold drink and somewhere to relax and watch life go by is pretty good as well.    

[Marc26]

11 hours ago, Honesto said:

Wake up everyone in Authority !

Phuket is in the tourist industry. I have been coming here for 36 years, initially for holidays and then to live.

Whilst I would prefer it to be the island paradise of old, those days are over. I understand what tourists like and should have to make their holidays enjoyable and memorable.

All this nonsense about public land, especially concerning beach facilities is ridiculous, Phuket is in the mass tourism industry. One does not have to destroy the natural beauty by having non permanent structures on the beaches.

The classic disaster was at Surin Beach, where there were some excellent clean, sanitary well run restaurants/beach clubs with immaculate sunbeds with canopies beachside of the road. This is what many tourists expect and are prepared to pay a little extra for.

Instead of the local government tearing them down, they should have granted annual leases to the owners to operate those illegally built premises and gained huge revenue which could have been spent on overseeing water sports operations, beach cleaning etc.

If you go to Surin Beach now it's a disaster, overrun with salengs, poor eating facilities with old and tatty umbrellas.

The TAT or Phuket governor should tell these local morons to learn from their mistakes.

I was shocked at how shitty Surin Beach is now

 

Your observation is spot on

[Grumpish]

9 hours ago, Marc26 said:

I was shocked at how shitty Surin Beach is now

Your observation is spot on

Phuket in general is a  tourist ghetto compared to what it was thirty years ago. There was a time when I dreamed of retiring there - now that I am actually retired and can afford to, there is no way that I would want to. 

[Vigo]

Patong Beach is representative  of the worst excessess of too many jetskis, motorboats with unsafe parasailing and a beach staked out by touts. Try sitting on the bech and you are yelled at by the parasail thugs who say the beachspot is theirs. 

The problem with the sunchairs was that it was controlled by mafia style thugs who ran off others. The corruption was rampant. Everytime an allowance was made, the operators pushed the boundaries. The quaint restaurants and beach clubs that people refer to at Surin were illegal. The operatiors paid no taxes, and no license fees. They did what they wanted. They hooked up electricity illegally and they dumped their raw sewage since they were not hooked up to the municipal  systems. 

Yes it would be nice to have sunbeds and organized food services as is done on the quasi private beaches around Bang Tao and the Laguna development but the typical  beach user is a selfish prat. I recall from my days in Patong what the tourists left behind; Their cigarette butts, the food debris, the glass bottles often broken and the garbage. Patong still has limited garbage receptacles, so garbage is dumped wherever. The food merchants certainly don't provide garbage  bins for their plastic bags or styrofoam containers.

The current adminisistration response is what is done when the people refuse to listen and the situation cannot be  managed otherwise. Just look at the  motorbike rental touts who monopolize the parking spaces for their business. Patong municipal government doesn't enforce  its own bylaws does it? The McDonalds on the beach road used to lose its front space to vendors who set up shop and harassed people who wanted to eat on the terrace.

[TheDirtyDurian]

On 4/1/2023 at 8:27 AM, RNikoley said:

"The classic disaster was at Surin Beach, where there were some excellent clean, sanitary well run restaurants/beach clubs with immaculate sunbeds with canopies beachside of the road. This is what many tourists expect and are prepared to pay a little extra for."

In a past life, I lived in Toulon, France for a couple of years and anyone who's ever spent much time in the Riviera has seen it done right (as well as in Spain, Italy, and any number of other places bordering the Med) and it's DELIGHTFUL.

Really, the coolest thing ever.

Before that, I lived in Japan for 5 years, on Sagami Bay, south of Tokyo and Yokohama. Every beach had the seasonal temporary structures. Beach bar/restaurant, one right after the other. Food stands galore. Also, DELIGHTFUL.

Blows my mind.

... Another one...

I came to Thailand a lot in the late 80s (when I lived in Japan), Pattaya mostly, and during the days, we'd often hop on the motorbikes and drive out to Jomtien. I can't recall there being anything much on the other side of the road but jungle. All the stuff, the quaint little beach bars, were all on the sand.

It was terrific.

Here I am 35 years later, and I live in Pratamnak, Jomtien, but I rarely go down to the beach. I go to a couple other places I know where I can at least sit in a restaurant that, if not right on the sand, at least butts up against it.

Not the same Italy where over 50% of the beaches are rented out to private resorts surely?

In some areas the percentage is much higher

[RNikoley]

23 minutes ago, TheDirtyDurian said:

Not the same Italy where over 50% of the beaches are rented out to private resorts surely?

In some areas the percentage is much higher

Yes, the same Italy.

Not sure how or why I strike you as somebody who plays games, or falls for the word antics of children and women.

[TheDirtyDurian]

40 minutes ago, RNikoley said:

Yes, the same Italy.

Not sure how or why I strike you as somebody who plays games, or falls for the word antics of children and women.

I guess we disagree about keeping beach access free and open for all then.

I play Wordle when I want to do a word game. 

[Alavan]

6 hours ago, Vigo said:

The quaint restaurants and beach clubs that people refer to at Surin were illegal. The operatiors paid no taxes, and no license fees. They did what they wanted. They hooked up electricity illegally and they dumped their raw sewage since they were not hooked up to the municipal  systems. 

Stayed a few times in Surin at that time. I must say that clubs like Catch beach Club and Bongo Rum bar, owned by Twin Palms, didn't look like illegal sewage dumping shacks. Well kept, higher standard... and suddenly everything had to go. Catch moved to Bang Tao beach, you still think it is illegal, hooking up electricity?

[RNikoley]

1 hour ago, TheDirtyDurian said:

I guess we disagree about keeping beach access free and open for all then.

I play Wordle when I want to do a word game. 

You guess wrong.

 

[TheDirtyDurian]

4 minutes ago, RNikoley said:

You guess wrong.

you mentioned the system in France where you say you lived, and referenced Spain and Italy as also being very good. 

I mentioned that Italy's beaches are heavily privatised. 

Presumably you like this system as you believe it to be good, so I don't really see how that matches with free, public access for all that I believe in. 

I hope that Thailand keeps its beaches free and open for all, and does not go down the Italian model. 

[Vigo]

1 hour ago, Alavan said:

Stayed a few times in Surin at that time. I must say that clubs like Catch beach Club and Bongo Rum bar, owned by Twin Palms, didn't look like illegal sewage dumping shacks. Well kept, higher standard... and suddenly everything had to go. Catch moved to Bang Tao beach, you still think it is illegal, hooking up electricity?

How about this; Where did their sewage run off go? None of the restaurants or facilities was legal and as such could not hook up to local systems legally. There wasn't even an operating wastewater system until 2018 (and even then it did not function.) . Apparently you missed the multi year problems related to the wastewater from the area's restaurants and hotels. Here's a reminder from 2016.  https://www.thephuketnews.com/wastewater-streams-onto-phuket-surin-beach-60016.php#U7XdJeX2HSoA1Sor.99

The fact is that the  beachclubs and restaurants were squatters. They ran off the general public as they  focused on their own profits without  paying anything back for the use of the  public beaches.

[Chatogaster]

3 hours ago, RNikoley said:

Not sure how or why I strike you as somebody who plays games, or falls for the word antics of children and women.

 

It's easy to interpret "children and women" in that sentence as an allusion to "inferior people" (it's actually quite hard to construe it otherwise), which turns your sentence into a word game/duel with "your opponent". 

There's some irony at play here: the post you replied to didn't stoop to silly word (or rather, psychological) games but your reply did.

Just stick to facts and defend your opinion (or change it if the counter arguments have more weight). Don't try to mute opposing voices by using superficial tactics.

 

[Marc26]

19 hours ago, Grumpish said:

Phuket in general is a  tourist ghetto compared to what it was thirty years ago. There was a time when I dreamed of retiring there - now that I am actually retired and can afford to, there is no way that I would want to. 

I think there is still plenty of spots in Phuket that are nice and I'd be happy to live there 

 

We go to Kamala a lot and I think it had the best beach set up in all of Thailand 

 

A great strip of bars/restaurants that are well kept

Then local street food type restaurants 

 

A very nice beach club

 

Without overtaking the beach like they do in other places

Bang Tao and some of the beach areas neat airport are also nice

 

 

The thing that sucks about Phuket is it's so congested that driving from one area to the other is a nightmare