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articles relating to the property market in Thailand and
Bangkok for the 'Your Money' section of the Bangkok Post.
He is a co-director of Condo Bangkok. |
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| How to give a City Heart |
How to give a City Heart
This article has been included within our articles section
When visitors to Bangkok asked for directions to the city centre, local residents used to be left floundering for an answer. Bangkok had no identifiable heart: prime locations and landmarks yes, but no focal point.
This changed a decade ago with the arrival of the Skytrain. Opening in a flurry of scepticism over what many saw as an inner city runabout of dubious impact (big retailers initially refused to pay for pedestrian link bridges), this modest two-line network has become the hub around which many urban Thais are designing their lives. A distinct Skytrain community is fast developing.
The Skytrain has fixed the city centre. Everybody wants to be near a station and there's no sign of a 'flight to the suburbs' as in the UK. Developers have been knocking down older buildings to put up structures designed for the new demand, says James Pitchon, director of estate agent CB Richard Ellis in Thailand.
For much of its 225 year history, the capital's authorities contented themselves with carving out a few major roads (or canals) for transport outside the royal enclaves, leaving great swathes of land to be filled in by a rapidly expanding population. The result was a mish-mash of development, a dearth of cross-town roads and a modern planning nightmare.
Until the arrival of the Skytrain, where one lived was rather arbitrary: an agreeable villa down any leafy lane (for the lucky or the rich) or a high-rise apartment anywhere, as long as you could stand the commuting distance to work. Buying property was often something of a lottery: who knew which way the city might be pulled next?
Even the arrival of the Skytrain in 1999 did little to signal a change. A fare of 15-40 baht (about 50p) for a short hop is relatively steep, especially when the lines stop well short of the outer suburbs in a metropolis six times the size of Singapore.
Yet many Bangkokians have adjusted to the Skytrain to the point where some choose to buy a small condominium instead of a car. I'm just a short rail ride away from work while most of my colleagues commute for hours. It's a financial commitment but it has given me a lifestyle of my dreams, says Praveena Tromyong, a legal secretary.
Several astute Thai developers quickly realised that the demand for one- and two-bedroom condominiums, albeit built on cheaper land further down the line, was potentially enormous.
Where previously a trip between the two busy commercial centres of Silom and Suriwongse would have taken at least an hour by taxi, the train enables people to do the journey in minutes. There are two routes, the Sukhumvit line and the Silom line, intersecting at Siam Square. Between them, they cover much of the central city.
Culturally we're different from New York, Tokyo or London in that we love our cars but you'll find more and more young people telling you they can't see the point of having one, says Andrew Hiransomboon, the editor of BK magazine, a lifestyle publication given away by inner city coffee shops. These people are looking for convenience and quality of life centred around art, culture, hip restaurants and cool places to hang out.
He adds: OK, there are still plenty of rich kids who don't mind sitting in their Mercedes Benzes for two hours to get to a bar but I think you'll hear the 'cool' people - the early adapters - saying that only suckers get stuck in traffic. It's people like this who will dictate where they meet.
The city is changing in other ways. A decade ago it was still unusual for respectable middle-class parents to permit their unmarried children, especially girls, to move away from home. Even after marriage, a couple often lived with one set of parents for several years.
The opening of the Skytrain roughly coincided with social shifts in Thailand away from the quasi-obligatory extended family. The availability of easy inner-urban transport seems to have encouraged so
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