Big fire down Soi Bintabaat

[margaretcarnes]

Both Cheers bar and Viking bar used to be the Joy guest house, until the owners put the rent up.

That explains the theory about the common roof space then. Any idea when Joy Guesthouse closed? I think it was still there about 2000/2001 - but surely Cheers was as well..... confused

[kendo]

When in town I drink in the U-Turn quite a lot and those bars opposite were knocked through and made bigger about four years ago.
I can't remember the old name of the bar but it was owned by a Scottish fella that now has a bar around in the new plaza I used to sit and have a beer with him.
Now these bars where never going to make money and where never busy once farang was gone the usual sitting around and complacency starts.
On first reading this story I never believed for one Minuit that the fire was raging for two hours all that wood it could of spread very quickly and very close to the temple school, could have been far worst.

Kendo.

[DSB]

Any idea when Joy Guesthouse closed? I think it was still there about 2000/2001 - but surely Cheers was as well..... confused

Billy moved from Joy guesthouse to the Bazzar in 1999

[StevePIraq]

maybe something good will come of this, HH needs a change

[johnnyk]

How long until most of what is there disappears? Its prime real estate for hotels.

[matthewnoel]

ying from nice and easy bar has a good video of the fire,good job she was there!

[margaretcarnes]

Billy moved from Joy guesthouse to the Bazzar in 1999

Thanks DSB - I never knew Billy W had that place before.

[richard]

I'm now hearing that the burnt premises are to become a hotel. At this rate there will soon more hotels and shops than bars down there. The fewer bars will obviously profit as a result.

[oakdale160]

You mean the sort of hotel where people stay in the room all night, thats selfish.

[Korkenzieher]

Can't help but feel that slowly but surely some sort of creeping, largely unmanaged, redevelopment of the area is underway. Grand plans shelved for a generation, gradual ossification of the centre of town in favour of a more distributed bar scene. The hassle value of repeated shutdowns and police clampdowns coupled with silly rents given the level of business will dissuade more and more from opening in the area, or into moving to some other area.

[Lung Per]

Can't help but feel that slowly but surely some sort of creeping, largely unmanaged, redevelopment of the area is underway. Grand plans shelved for a generation, gradual ossification of the centre of town in favour of a more distributed bar scene. The hassle value of repeated shutdowns and police clampdowns coupled with silly rents given the level of business will dissuade more and more from opening in the area, or into moving to some other area.

It's allright they move as long as we are informed where they move to

[richard]

The tourist profile has changed too. More families and fewer Binta bonkers

[johnnyk]

It's valuable real estate, too valuable for tin-roof beer bars. IMO it's going where Pattaya has gone (no, not to hell). Tin-roof bars along Beach Rd. gave way to condos, a giant mall and hotels. The bars moved inland between 2nd road and soi Buakhow where the antics of punters and girls are less visible to family holidayers.
The bars and girls will never go away because 1) It's Thailand, there must be boze and sex 2) too many poo yai (land owners,cops, city worthies) are making plenty of money.

[Korkenzieher]

While that might be the case - and probably for some, the plan - I can't help but feel that pushing the bars out of that area would be to the long term detriment of tourism in Hua Hin. Most tourists (residents views are different, I know), families included, want to stagger from the beach to the hotel, then fall out of their hotel into a bar (and vice-versa) and not have to go searching some remote part of town for entertainment.

The worst thing Hua Hin could do, IMHO, is what Udon did (and was mooted as an option for Soi 94), which was to build a night bar complex which was about as family unfriendly as it could get. Udon Night and Day (aka The Cowshed) was a disastrous attempt to create a new 'night scene' which at best only appealed to mongers and p*ss-heads. Nowadays, half of the units are empty, and I can't help feel that sometime soon, a new development on Soi Farang will see the whole wretched lot bulldozed away, consigning a once relatively lively urban bar scene in Udon to the footnotes of history.

Ultimately I fear Hua Hin will try something similarly misguided. It is, I guess, fairly clear, that a shift towards Asian tourists, from Europeans, in itself threatens the tourism market. They aren't interested in bars and restaurants that were developed to cater for Western tastes. I don't expect it to end well, and job creation on the fringe will be stopped pretty much in its tracks.

[margaretcarnes]

It's valuable real estate, too valuable for tin-roof beer bars. IMO it's going where Pattaya has gone (no, not to hell). Tin-roof bars along Beach Rd. gave way to condos, a giant mall and hotels. The bars moved inland between 2nd road and soi Buakhow where the antics of punters and girls are less visible to family holidayers.
The bars and girls will never go away because 1) It's Thailand, there must be boze and sex 2) too many poo yai (land owners,cops, city worthies) are making plenty of money.

That could certainly be the ultimate aim of HH planners. But the layout of HH, together with existing development of hotels and condos along Petkhasem, doesn't make it seem like such an attractive prospect to me.
It works in Pattaya because they were able to expand back to 3rd Road. OK 2nd Road is a nightmare, but at least there is no need for tourists to stray north and south between hotels and bar scene. It's pretty much a central block, and much better served by baht buses than HH.
HH has a railway line cutting right through it. Also a lot of land taken up by the golf course. Any bar development beyond the track on Chomsin/Canal Rd etc is pretty limited to attracting expats.
Which as far as the more central area of town goes leaves the stretch of road along the Eastern side of the track for a more developed bar area, and possibly a very small part of Srasong. Although if ChatChai market ever is redeveloped that could change things again.
I did think that Soi 78 could follow Soi 80 bar wise, but its' shacks would have to be completely replaced so, like the ruined Viking/Cheers bars, would more likely be replaced by yet more hotels than by small bars. (Maybe that has already begun?)
scrap the Collunade and build a bar complex on it!