Fast track Thailand and Cambodia rail - and UK?

A vigorous full page editorial today from the Bangkok Post emphasises the success and potential for the new rail link from Bangkok through to Phnom Penh in Cambodia. The link opened in April by both Prime Minister Chanocha and Hun Sen just a few weeks before the ASEAN Summit chaired by Thailand emphasised connectivity.

https://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/1709027/rail-link-a-worthy-effort


That all the more relevant for the next link from PP through to HCMC in Vietnam as Vietnam chairs next year's ASEAN sessions. Indeed the Vietnam Transport Minister urging a hurry up on such links. That at the Strategic Dialogue in London last week between UK and Vietnam - usually the discussions more tea-and-biscuits Dialogue than Strategy and even less on delivery over the last decade.

Perhaps the current rail timetable not factoring in the potential to ease congestion on Thailand's roads - as well as a road safety boost beyond the zooming minivans.

The Bangkok Post again this week with a full page article Bullet Train Bangkok to Beijing - a pastiche of the Michael Caine later Harry Palmer actioner - on the potential for hispeed rail from Bangkok and indeed Singapore upto Hong Kong and Beijing's OBOR:

https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/1708122/from-bangkok-to-beijing

While with Khun Thanathorn and Pannika of the Future Forward party in London this week, the Thai opposition leaders after the recent Thai elections, the debate no doubt centering on Thai military budget doubling under the junta to 7% GDP (UK and EU around 2% and higher even than USA's 6%) and conscription - but also the Hyperloop and Isaan initially raised in the election.

Isaan to the fore, and the slow train of development even before the Charter referendum with Ubon and Laos only connected to BKK in the 1950's according to the Isaan Voices book, in the new report from Asia Foundation by the dynamic Khun Rattana Lao:

https://asiafoundation.org/2019/06/05/thailands-inequality-unpacking-the-myths-and-reality-of-isan/

With the now open Thai-Cambodia rail link on my 2015 and onwards manifesto, Richard Branson and Hyperloop and Isaan surely a feature in Thailand as well as the next UK election likely this Autumn after the Boris-Hunt PM battles building momentum for Redshirt Jeremy Corbyn's Labour and Remain.

Certainly it's too early to discuss in detail the 10,000 islands of Laos or Vinh deep sea port or Project Chaika. Or even Bangkok as ASEAN hub for Sincerity Advertising and PR.

The UK in Thailand gaining another boost with the announcement of 750 new Tesco stores - no doubt to rival 7-11 for rail station outlets as well as malls.

And The Independent, whisper it quietly, today urging on HS2 the UK equivalent of the bullet train after the success of HS1 and Hitachi here in East Kent: Eurostar trains linking London with Paris and Brussels through the Channel Tunnel:

https://inews.co.uk/opinion/sub-standard-trains-hs2-modern-network-simon-kelner-opinion/


That perhaps more important for UK infrastructure with delays on Heathrow and Gatwick development and the setback for UK-USA infrastructure cooperation for the moment in the POTUS Trump, rightful, concerns over Ambassador Darroch insults and leaks.

Neither helpful in plugging gaps in USA's crumbly rail and airport infrastructure - perhaps POTUS Trump's 1776 airports slip in his 4th July speech accurate in the cement needing to be poured to repair USA's ancient infrastructure beyond the Hudson Yards and Mexican Wall to pull together USA again.

Certainly the 2020 USA elections will need to show more concrete results than just a few East Kent Core Company Airfix or Hornby models of airports or railways gathering dust in the White House basement.

But Thailand's leap forward on ASEAN links deserving of more momentum not just on the PP-HCMC link or Laos and Isaan but through Kwai and Kanchanaburi upgrades to Yangon and onto India.

The sensitive updating of the Kwai links with Thailand and UK and Australia (the latter with the rather marvellous Hellfire Pass museum already) cooperation with East Kent and Japan's Hitachi and Toshiba, through to Imphal and Kohima in India perhaps no greater symbol of 21st century reconciliation.

Australia may even benefit in overhauling its hispeed rail network not just on the East coast of Brisbane to Sydney and Adelaide or even onto Perth. But rather tourism boosts and the strategic closure of Western Australia's backdoor onto the Indian Ocean - the continental circular road network only completed by 1985.

Perhaps this week's UNESCO list flagging up the potential with new sites in Myanmar with Bagan and Laos at the Plain of Jars - my desk as I write this with a pencil jar from the Jars.

And Isaan's Khmer temples placed on the UNESCO Tentative List - the Royal Road through Cambodia to Thailand surely a mega-boost to tourism and trade along with the rail links. Even ahead of the 2034 ASEAN World Cup bid:

https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/1709543/two-sites-placed-on-unesco-tentative-list

And if UK efforts have been rather feeble in Laos and especially Myanmar (and the briefly touted UK 2030 World Cup bid) given the potential for Commonwealth links with India and Malaysia an Australia, the the new UNESCO site in UK with the Jodrell Bank space telescope form 1957 highlighting the potential for the new ASEAN Space programme with UK and Australia. That Cambodia Space Project echoing the music of the spheres, before the next tsunami or Climate Change floods, with weather satellites, seabed scans and robot subs etc.

All relevant to summit the next phase of the Thai car parts industry.

Thailand and ASEAN certainly should be reaching to outer space once the outer reaches of Thailand and ASEAN's borders are bridged by rail.

The UK's expertise in inventing and building railways and metros and stations and bus interchanges and mega-tunnels and super sewers through UK and Asia and USA is poised to help.

@timg33