Koh Rong int’l airport construction begins

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Cooldude
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Re: Koh Rong int’l airport construction begins

Post by Cooldude »

Cambodia, Thailand and the Netherlands. Even the North Sea beach in the Netherlands looked awful last September, despite a pretty strong current taking all the plastic to more quiet places.

Don't forget Vietnam. The last swim I had at Vung Tau a few years ago, I came out of the water with a couple of plastic shopping bags wrapped around my legs.
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armchairlawyer
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Re: Koh Rong int’l airport construction begins

Post by armchairlawyer »

Doc67 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 25, 2024 8:10 am Who is going to use it?

PP - SNK is now doable on the road in ~2.5 hours, plus a rather 'interesting' boat ride - add 45 mins - so door to door from PP to a hotel on Koh Rong is now around 5 hours, allowing for connections, and for around $90 for a couple each way. I think @armchairlawyer lawyer did this trip a while back.

Any flight from PP airport will take 30 mins to get to the airport, check in + waiting around for the plane add another 90 mins (and that would be cutting it fine), plus about 45 mins in the air. Deplane and then deal with the newly minted taxi/tuk mafia to your hotel, add another 45 mins. Total, 3.5 hours, at best. But the cost of flights will be huge if the PP-SAI route is anything to go by, the time saving is marginal and is hardly going to justify $75 per head each way (or more?) plus taxis to and from the airports (add another $20.) That's $170 per couple each way.

So who is going to use this airport? The Chinese? They aren't beachy type people, are they?

And the last time I looked, Koh Rong has very little going on and is barely worth a cheap trip from PP. If you are in Bangkok, KL or SGN, you are spoilt for choice for beach destinations. I can't see Koh Rong attracting anywhere near enough to justify a direct flight.

Sure, with a new airport there will be some speculation from developers looking to build huge resorts, but this is all a huge gamble. Isn't there a Dara Sakor airport and a resort that is a flop? Just because you build it, it does not guarantee they will come.

So, who is going to use this airport?
Cambodia does seem to be getting very enthsiastic about airports recently. New roads and railways provide clear and obvious economic benefits because factory and agricultural export costs will come down a lot. Tourism will also benefit.
But the airports will really only benefit tourism. And as surface journey times rapidly shrink due to the lovely new roads, so the need for domestic and short haul international air travel will diminish. I can only see Koh Rong airport being viable as a medium haul destination, eg from Chinese cities. As there is not a lot of hotel beds on the island, there will need to be massive development to provide that supply. Of course as of now, tourist travel out of China remains at very low levels compared to pre-covid and that is clearly how their government wants it for the time being. But sooner or later that will change. Direct flights from China to Koh Rong could well attract government support if there are no casinos on the island and the tourists can be barred from going to SHV to the casinos there. It's the same logic as SAI airport - fly from China into a location where there are no casinos.
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Flexxman
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Re: Koh Rong int’l airport construction begins

Post by Flexxman »

jaynewcastle wrote: ↑Wed Jan 24, 2024 3:03 pm Both Koh Rong islands have seen massive development since I first went in 2014 & so happy to have seen them then (like going to Ko Phi Phi in Thailand in the 1980/1990's I guess)

Do any of the old-timers think massive development & increased tourists numbers by 1000's of % has improved anywhere they visited years ago ?, I doubt it

Virtually everywhere you go in SE Asia, there is massive uncontrolled development (it seems), and everybody (understandably) trying to jump on the money train to make as much money as they can
I visited Koh Rong for the first time in 2005, at the time had to charter your own boat for that at Independence beach in Sihanoukville. Later years you could take a slow boat departing from the harbour near the chicken village, where also the ferries from/to the border with Thailand used to arrive. Even later fast boats from the pier at Ocheteal were available.

Development in SEA is indeed crazy, recently looked at this site often mentioned here as well https://futuresoutheastasia.com/ which has some nice examples - and not only Sihanoukville. Future Koh Rong was last updated with pics in January 2022: https://futuresoutheastasia.com/future-koh-rong/. Example in Vietnam is Novaworld https://futuresoutheastasia.com/novaworld-phan-thiet/, recent video on Youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xW7ogKZsS4 - in Vietnamese so have to use auto-generated captions or just view the images...

Other: have used the Sihanoukvile airport for flights to Saigon in the past. No frills but just a short flight.
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jaynewcastle
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Re: Koh Rong int’l airport construction begins

Post by jaynewcastle »

Why would tourists be interested in going to tropical islands with beautiful beaches ?, answer seems obvious to me.

Make it much easier to fly to directly, & tourists numbers will rise a lot more than they already have the last 10 years

The islands have seen a lot of development and a lot of new hotels built in the last 10 years, all catering to tourists with much more money who want modern facilities such as AC etc, rather than the cheap backpacker huts that provided most of the accommodation when I first went
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jaynewcastle
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Re: Koh Rong int’l airport construction begins

Post by jaynewcastle »

" And the last time I looked, Koh Rong has very little going on and is barely worth a cheap trip from PP. If you are in Bangkok, KL or SGN, you are spoilt for choice for beach destinations "

Some of the beaches I've seen on the Koh Rong islands match the best I have seen in Thailand ( on the small southern islands), and SE Asia such as Boracay (Phils)

Vietnam is not a beach destination for anybody wanting beautiful beaches, neither is Malaysia

Many people going to small tropical islands don't need or want a lot going on generally, they're easily able to entertain & occupy themselves
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