HEADLINES [click on headline to view story]:

More road repairs needed

Exactly where does one get a taxi?

People vs plants

Why can’t someone fix the road?

Nam Prapa losing water

Full moon messes

Cross at Crossley

More road repairs needed

Dear Sirs,
I write in the hope that someone at city hall’s road service department will take heed of the following facts regarding the ongoing problems of Siam Country Club Road in the area just east of the electricity sub station and opposite Park Village.

This road has been breaking up for quite some time resulting in daily accidents, mud and dust. Some of the potholes are as deep as 30cms and over a meter wide. We have seen a number of attempts to effect repairs, some of which are laughable. Can you imagine filling in main road potholes with soil? Well that is exactly what these people are doing. As soon as it rains the soil is washed out resulting in reappearing potholes and more mud followed by more dust.
Friday June 22nd the road was repaired again and yes, with more soil followed by rain ... you can guess the rest. Who is controlling this department, where are the supervisors and where are the funds for proper and effective road repairs? I recently read that five truck drivers are to be prosecuted for driving with excess loads. The article went on to say that the operators had influential friends and were therefore untouchable. Interesting to say the least. If for whatever reason there are insufficient funds for road repairs why not impose a 100 baht levy on each construction truck movement? With the endless stream of them up and down this particular road there would soon be enough money collected to fix the road properly.
Name and address supplied

Exactly where does one get a taxi?

Editor;
You may remember my husband Steve’s plight as he was ridiculed by Thai passengers and baht bus drivers because he was too slow to get on and off the bus, as I wrote to your fine paper many months ago. Steve suffered a stroke. He was told that he should pay more because he takes too long. If Steve could type, he would express to Tony Crossley his ire over the taxi comment in Crossley’s rambling attack on Colonel Bonafide.
I can’t write what Steve really said, but I think I can make my point easily when I tell you that taxis aren’t allowed to pick up passengers for local destinations. As Steve says in his own way, duh!
We have decided never to return to Pattaya precisely because of the overpricing, the gouging and the lack of respect for elderly and the disabled. You should have seen my poor Steve when the baht bus driver lurched forward before Steve had time to get on the bus. Steve suffered a concussion and fractured femur when he rolled backwards onto the street. Steve’s walker remained on the bus never to be seen again. The humiliation of not having anyone help while the Thais on the baht bus pointed and laughed was just too much for Steve and me. We echo the sentiment of the holocaust victims when we say never again. Never again!
Bobbi Dooley

People vs plants

Editor;
The residents along Siam Country Club Road have been and are, without water most of the time, due to a decrepit water main. Nevertheless, our city elders choose to install new pipelines along Sukhumvit, to water the plants. The fact that it cost millions of baht and never works seems immaterial. A water truck would have been better. Current Score: Plants 1 - People 0. Please upgrade the old before building the new.
Very Dry Resident

Why can’t someone fix the road?

Editor;
I read the ‘Baywatch’ article by Narisa Nitikarn about the state of the Soi Khao Noi/Wat Boonsamphan road. I am just recovering from a motorbike crash I had a bit further up the road at the T-junction where the new 7/11 is. I was driving up Soi Khao Noi when a pickup truck coming from the opposite direction pulled into the middle of the road to turn right at the junction, which left me with nowhere to go but into the pot holes at the side of the road. I came off my bike and landed badly, fracturing two ribs and a bone in my foot and I was badly cut up and bruised all down my left side apart from my head because I was wearing a good crash helmet. I spent three days in hospital and a month in pain, mainly from my broken ribs, at home.
A friend of mine came off his bike at the same spot, and about a year ago a Thai lad was killed on the same stretch of road when he hit a pot hole in the dark and landed on his head (no helmet) on a concrete drain cover.
Nongprue council did a good job filling in the pot holes at the top end of Soi Khao Noi at the junction with Soi Khaotalo, and resurfaced it with concrete (although shortly after somebody came and drilled up part of it to lay a pipe under the road), so why can’t they fix the rest of the road? I would gladly pay for a lorry load of ready-mix concrete to be dumped at the corner where I had my accident, if they provide the labour to fill in the pot holes. That would hopefully prevent anyone else having an accident there.
There is also a problem with the sandy soil which is washed down from the top of the hill by heavy rains. This makes the surface of the road unstable for motorbikes and in the hot weather it dries out and the wind blows it about and covers everything in a film of dust.
J. Arno
Royal Green Park
Soi Khao Noi

Nam Prapa losing water

Dear Editor;
For over three months now, many people living in Soi Arunothai 4 have been phoning the office at Nam Prapa, with the result that sometimes some Nam Prapa maintenance person passes by and puts some tissue in a hole leaking water (see photo), but later the water pressure presses these tissues out again. With a kettle we measured 12 liters per minute, which means about 50 m3 per month!
Many more liters of precious water will get lost if Nam Prapa does not decide to repair it properly. It is a pity to look at this day per day.
Regards
Jack

Full moon messes

Aloha;
Why is it that every time there is a full moon party, somewhere, the beach at Jomtien gets trashed from garbage, plastic and foam food containers that wash up onto the beach? I am starting to understand why the vendors quit cleaning the beach other then their little space.
Do you think that the people that clean up after a full moon party rake the waste into the ocean? Do you know that there is still a 10 thousand baht reward, if there are pictures and a conviction on the people that are trashing our earth? Do you know that the ocean is close to being so contaminated that tourists will avoid Jomtien and Pattaya Beach and go to other places? I plan on moving to another area after I have given of myself 5 years of cleaning the beach, setting examples, due to the fact that most of you have deaf ears to the calling of Mother Nature. Why am I the only one that can hear the cry? Why am I the only one that cares? I am ashamed of all of the farangs that live and visit Thailand. I now understand why they are changing the visa rules. You bring in baht, but you also bring your garbage and bad habits with you. I’m sure there are some kind hearted good people out there, I just haven’t seen many as of yet.
KOTO, The keeper of the ocean

Cross at Crossley

Editor;
It is not a surprise that Tony Crossley has little understanding of history. Mr. Crossley admittedly gets his facts from the BBC. Americans my age have a decent wealth of knowledge when it comes to world history as we have lived it. For the benefit of a confused Mr. Crossley allow me to add some verifiable facts to his gross misinterpretation of history.
Abraham Lincoln ended slavery with gunpowder and a pen sir; and he was no liberal. President Lincoln was a conservative Republican. Slavery in America was perpetuated by liberals and opposed by conservatives. That’s history Mr. Crossley and as such, it is also fact. Had you cracked open an American History Book you might know these things.
Contrary to popular crap spewed by the BBC and other liberal news media, the war between the States was not over slavery, it was State rights vs. the Federal Government. Unfortunately the Federal Government won.
While I correctly described stealing in my op ed, you have managed to twist my words while neither addressing nor refuting the content. What you have done sir, is to twist facts into a psychedelic rainbow of confusion.
Let me make things clearer for you in the hopes that giving you more rope will allow you to make a bigger fool of yourself. Stealing 5 baht or 1 million baht is still considered stealing. When someone overcharges me, they steal from me. Allowing them to continue their theft by turning the other cheek is tantamount to acquiescing to their thievery. Don’t quote the Bible Mr. Crossley as I’m sure you’ve never read it. God helps those who help themselves. Why don’t you help yourself to a history shelf at your local library to begin the process?
Colonel Lloyd Bonafide, USMC Retired
Jomtien

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