Phuket Beach Vendors Have Equipment Cleared by Patong Council Workers
Thursday, September 4, 2014
PHUKET: Council staff in a truck carried off equipment being stored at Patong beach last night, using bolt cutters to sever chains binding ice chests and sets of plastic chairs.
The message to vendors seeking to slowly creep back onto the beaches and resume ''normal'' service by the coming high season was reinforced by the Mayor of Patong today.
Chalermlak Kebsub told Phuketwan that mobile vendors still operating on Patong beach were not allowed to leave items on the beach.
''Anything in use on the beaches has to be brought in each day and taken away at night,'' she said.
The options for vendors on Patong are still being determined. A plan for a small number of sunbeds to be operated by the poorest of the vendors is being considered.
Would-be ''poor'' vendors are undergoing a strict examination of their possessions and bank accounts.
Elsewhere at Surin, Kamala and most other beaches, all vendors have been banned. Sunbeds have disappeared entirely and tourists now sit on towels or mats on the sand.
The military, which took power in Thailand on May 22, has made clearing Thailand's public beach of private enterprise a priority.
|
Comments
Comments have been disabled for this article.
Is anyone going to clear away the wreckage on Ya Nui beach, it looks like a demolition site, worse than sunbeds. Please finish what you started. Nature, not a demolition site.
Posted by
Feisty Farang
on
September 4, 2014 17:34
I don't understand this. The people who who take care of the beach chairs and serve tourists are normally hired hands, not vendors.
A typical vendor has about 50 sets,
200 b for one set makes 10.000 a day,
This is not poor people business.
Income for 1000 chairs in tree months is a big amount. Try to do the math.
Why don't the public operate this business and use the income for lifeguards and keeping the beach clean?
Perhaps the could be a little left for fix road junctions and rainwater drains.
Posted by
Sherlock
on
September 4, 2014 18:46
Editor Comment:
Because the beaches are for the public and commercial enterprises are banned - whether by private people or the local council. Please absorb that fact, Sherlock.
Keep up the good work, be careful allowing any enterprise back on the beach. Seen Ya Nui what a mess. I saw a young fellow raking up rubbish on Ya Nui good job I thought, he was in fact recycling. Dumping it at the other end of the beach for the sea to take it away and no doubt deposit it back where it came from or over to Nai Harn.
Posted by
Al
on
September 4, 2014 20:05
did they get rid of the obnoxious parasailing? Super dangerous! And how about the jet skis?
Who cares about Tshirt venders, they aren to hurting anyone.
Posted by
Vfaye
on
September 4, 2014 20:34
Most people, both tourists and the ones living her, are happy to see the beaches cleared of sunbeds and umbrellas. However, there are also people that prefers sunbeds and umbrellas: older people that has difficulties to lay down/get up from a towel at the beach, parents with children that need shadow etc. If Phuket wants to attract both young, elderly and very young people, then there have to be some zones with beach chairs and umbrellas on the beaches. This zones should be operated by the municipality and the income should be used as salary for life guards, cleaning of the beaches, maintanence etc.
Posted by
PhuketFriendly
on
September 4, 2014 22:32
Editor Comment:
As we've said, PF, the municipalities have been in charge of the beaches all along and because the vendors - or the people who control the vendors - are voters, there is no such thing as control. Tourists of all ages are coping quite well, and the beaches are beautiful. No need for sunbeds.
Rumours are rife at the moment with what is going on in other beach destinations leading to some owners of restaurants on beaches in Khao Lak whose property has been removed of some form of change. Latest, for instance, is that the restaurant owners are watching carefully what is happening in Hua Hin, where, in the past few days as they understand it, some licences have been given for specific size beach plots with designated numbers of beds/tables/chairs but with no permanent structures allowed and a requirement to close every Wednesday. Mind you he mustn't have much faith in the rumour as he has rented a unit on a road leading to the beach and will soon be operating legally there as is happening in other areas and I'm sure will be happening throughout Phuket. If not, it will all have been a waste of time.
Posted by
Alan
on
September 4, 2014 22:35
These 's a nice picture from the army with guns on the beaches in Thailand . Send it to al the newspapers in Europe " Welcome to Thailand" and then they are suprice to half minus tourisme in Thailand
Posted by
malena
on
September 5, 2014 03:02
Sherlock has a point....was at a beach National Park in Trang province couple of months back..they were charging all users (Thais) 300bt entrance fee....sadly no maintenance or upkeep evident...no water,abandoned structures,garbage etc...
Saw a few vehicles simply turn around..refused to pay I guess.
Posted by
David
on
September 5, 2014 07:16
malena, as the caption says, this picture was taken back in June just after the coup on 22 May. I don't think it's had too much effect on Tourism.
Posted by
pozz59
on
September 5, 2014 09:12
Editor Comment:
If anything, security and safety have improved with the military takeover. Uniforms and weapons are seldom seen.
Can a tourist bring his own sun chair every day?
Posted by
Naithon
on
September 5, 2014 14:04
Editor Comment:
Sure. Some people already do. Some resorts will probably offer a service.
@ Ed - you wrote "A plan for a small number of sunbeds to be operated by the poorest of the vendors is being considered"
My point was, that poor sunbeds vendors don't exist, which leads to public run of this lucrative business, if there should be any sunbeds on any beach.
Jet-skies are present on the sand of Patong Beach in great numbers right now.
Please forgive me and perhaps other confused people if we don't understand
the way commercial enterprises are banned on beaches.
Posted by
Sherlock
on
September 5, 2014 14:35
Council staff has no chance against the concentrated charge of greed. How long they will have power and staff to stand it?
As far as I see nobody ever got any fine for illegal working until now, right?
Please not start to do rotten compromises, this is the begin of the end.
catch them in the act, do plainclothed patrols and penalize them. Again and again and again.
Posted by
Georg The Viking
on
September 5, 2014 15:06
"Elsewhere at Surin, Kamala and most other beaches, all vendors have been banned. Sunbeds have disappeared entirely and tourists now sit on towels or mats on the sand."
Well I have been down on Surin Beach weekly as recently as last Sunday and there at the North end of the beach are still colored bean bag chairs matching the design colors of those beach clubs. BIMI and CATCH. They populate the beach side they once had construction on but seem to "mark" their reserved space each day. At the end near Zazada it says on the sign to rent a mat with a pillow is 100 baht! How is this different then sunchairs??
Posted by
James Bond
on
September 5, 2014 15:16
Editor Comment:
How many did you see on the sand, JB? If you can't tell the difference between a sunbed and an umbrella and a mat with a pillow, something is wrong with you. By the way, we noted the same kind of development at Surin last week. The authorities will need to reinforce the message at Surin, as they have done at Patong. Remember that by the end of the month, all illegal restaurants and beach clubs will have been demolished.
No jetski or parasailing? hmm maybe we can rent a rifle from the army now and shoot jellyfish instead i can see that they are present at the beach now a days.... Lets make the best of a worse situation LOL
Posted by
ThailandFan
on
September 6, 2014 23:11
|
Is anyone going to clear away the wreckage on Ya Nui beach, it looks like a demolition site, worse than sunbeds. Please finish what you started. Nature, not a demolition site.
Posted by Feisty Farang on September 4, 2014 17:34