johnpat

you can go from Soi Buakhao to Soi 15 by motorbike now .. not a car yet.. I'm not sure what's under those mounds of dirt and scrap concrete... something unfinished no doubt. They have not figured out what to do with the water leak next to the Grand Avenue condo. They've only been working on it for a month or so, give them time. You must be patient. You an squeeze by on a motorbike if they're not actively working and accomplishing nothing at this spot. On the other end of Soi 15 by Second road it's a complete disaster. You can see the pipe with open end buried in the sand Some good news but hard to see in this picture. The seem to have finished putting in the concrete surface of Second Road at this point. The grates are sticking up (eventually they'll put in tarmac as they are doing on Beach Road) but until then you'll not want to drive on this concrete as you'll run into a grate.

Two days ago this intersection of Soi 15 and Soi Buakhao had rebar down and was ready to be concreted.... But they've made negative progress here (although they did repair the break in the big pipe)

The two unfinished sections of soi 15's connection to Soi Buakhao

This is the head of the construction work that's been putting wires underground. They have been moving quickly down second road from the Central Festival Mall and have passed the Royal Garden mall on the way to, one assumes, Pattaya Tai. But there's a problem if you turn 180 degrees. There's the soi 15 crew who have been taking forever to make the junction of the soi 15 pipe and the second road pipe. They've had their side of the road blocked for ages. If the construction crews meet second road will be shut off completely. That may explain why the soi 15 crew were working long hours last night but as of this morning there's still a lot of them to do.

between the Travelodge and the Grand Avenue condo. Just need to drop a big pipe in there and cover it up.. No progress on the Soi 15 to Soi Buakhao connection. This is how they fashion grates over the flimsy pipe sticking up. I drove by the soi 15 and Second Road intersection and it's looking worse than ever. Two big pits. Lots of rebar and no sign that they are wrapping up.

Here's the English translation of an article today about the soi 15 (and part of Second road) construction. The city wants it done by Sept 20. fyi: The contractor has yet to make any city imposed deadlines over the last few years.

This is the big mistake Tree Town makes -- they built a nice road and then didn't use it for what God intended (i.e. motorbike parking) and instead put tables on it. I like parking close to if not right in front of the place I patronize. I think most expats have motorbikes and if you want to attract them you need it to be convenient.

With Second Road one lane from soi 13 to Central the folks at city hall felt people had not suffered enough so they chose to repave Beach Road which was in great shape to begin with.

It looks like they are making some concrete cubes for joining the pipes and making an access point to drainage system. Did they realize the cheapo access pipe joined to the big pipe idea was a bad idea?

End of October has been my guess for a while. It will make it a nice clean 2 years to complete something that should have taken 2 months. That's a good measure of incompetence. The part Google shows as closed off is way too long which is making it hard to plan trips from City Garden or Urban condos as the first step requires a magic leap to an open road (even though in reality the road is finished in front of those condos). Today people had blazed a trail in the dirt road so it was actually possible to drive a car down soi 15 to Second Road. There's no telling if that will work tomorrow. It's good that Google be pessimistic if and when they decide to do some serious work on that section again we don't want folks confused and driving into ditches.

The drainage work is mostly done except right near soi 15 where they still have a big open pit with lots of pre-existing pipes visible and I guess they are trying to figure out how to install their big pipe around all the existing plumbing. However not content to offer the citizens some relief they started two -- count em -- two projects on the left side of Second Road near Central where they are burying electrical cables, making Second Road once again a one lane road and backing up traffic quite a distance (and on Soi Diana too).

Soi 15 looking up to Soi Buakhao. Working on laying concrete but they'll have to drain the lake first. The pipe on the right is bad news.. looks like that has yet to be put in. Add another week to the "schedule". You can see five visible signs at the Hideaway saying "We are open" with more out of sight to the left. There's even a signboard outside the entrance proclaiming they are open. Are they open? No they are not. They will open at 8am. Turning 180 degrees we see that they have actually put down some concrete. It's only take a few months but we see actual roadway being replaced. Hooray. A closeup of the place where they must fashion a custom grate over the pipes with the steps leading down. In most of the Soi 15 disaster project they dropped big concrete cubes which offered a nice big area that one could enter to clean out the big pipe. In this project to finish the ends of Soi 15 they've got this new procedure which uses these small pipes as access to big pipe. Why? Is it cheaper? It doesn't seem faster. It doesn't seem as reliable.

Soi 15 disaster status: Very little work on the Second Road side for a week or so. They laid some concrete and built a grate over one of those tubes sticking up and then abandoned the project. The photo shows the Soi Buakhao side. As far as I can tell they've buried the pipe from Soi Buakhao to the Hideaway (and maybe further). They did not link up the Soi 15 pipe to the Soi Buakhao pipe so that's something that will take a while for them to figure out. The photo shows that they are setting up to lay some concrete on a section of the soi. Again like on the Second Road side they are not extending the existing concrete on either end but are instead putting some concrete in the middle where it does no one any good. But it is progress and that is a good thing.

I'm sticking to my estimate of November. If I start to see them accomplishing something at more than a snail's pace I may change my estimate.

Cars and motorbikes leaving the Grand Avenue underground garage must do a tight right u-turn into the dirt lot in front of the condo complex, drive through that lot and make a left crossing a dirt bridge to Soi Boomerang. Then down that Soi and a sharp right past girls sitting outside gentleman's clubs to Soi Buakaow. As a result lots of residents have chosen to park along both sides of the finished part of soi 15 making it a one lane road at places thus sharing their misery with other soi 15 residents. So far there has been no visible progress on the link from Soi 15 to Soi Buakaow. Yes they go out and work with big machines and move dirt around but they've accomplished exactly nothing in these last few months. Is there anyone in charge?

Soi 15 to Soi Buakaow this morning. It's hard to see what they've accomplished in the last few months and what they still have to do. There's a pipe sticking up so presumably they managed to bury at least one pipe. There seems to be no method to their madness.

Well that's not going to happen. Maybe it will be done by October but likely November on the two year anniversary of the start of this disaster of a project. I've seen them construct vast roadways such as Highway 7 and now highway 3 south of Pattaya. Yet just constructing 800 meters of soi 15 takes two years. It's all about manpower and they did not put enough people and machines on this project from the beginning and continuing to now.

This is where the completed construction of soi 15 will meet with Second road. In over a month they've made no discernible progress toward that goal but they have managed to accumulate far more giant pipes than they need to complete this small unfinished section. Maybe the construction project is just a ruse and their real work is in buying and selling big pipes.

They are rushing to finish second road before the big Marathon this coming weekend. The biggest problem now is the entrance to soi 15. There are still a lot of imperfections in the new roadway that I know to avoid on my motorbike. I worry the people running down this road before dawn might be twisting their ankle at spots.

This is soi 15 connecting to Second Road. They are installing one of those big pipes with a small pipe sticking out. What's that all about? Here's my guess. What they had been doing for the completed parts of the soi 15 is put in a big concrete block every so many meters and that block would have a drain constructed on top and a big pipe on either end. So it would serve as a junction point. I have not seen any big concrete blocks for this resumed construction. Could the small pipe be placed upwards and above it they will construct a drain? So this pipe section will join two big plastic pipes as well as offering a drain into the big pipes? It would be faster than the big concrete block idea but not a sturdy.... I guess we'll see.

I'm guessing that there will be high tables and chairs along the front adjacent to sidewalk. After all the main draw of those bars is watching everything go by while enjoying a drink. Then it will look more cozy at least..

In the new Made in Thailand complex where is the space for motorbike parking for staff and visitors?

In November of 2021 they started destroying soi 15 at this end and it looks like they are finally going to finish the job and connect the soi 15 drainage system with the second road drainage system and restore the roadway completely. Then they'll have to work on finishing the other end connecting Soi Buakaow to the Soi 15 drainage system..

They've begun to move the construction area into the Second Road and Pattaya Tai intersection. Looking in the hole I can see problems. There are a large number of pipes crossing the trench visible in the hole. They drop one of the huge black drainage pipes in the trench like in other places. They are going to have to relocate all those small pipes first.

It looks like they are going to have to dig up the intersection of Pattaya Tai and Second Road to connect the pipes... I sure hope not ... We will soon see.