total nutter wrote: ↑Fri Jan 10, 2025 5:12 pm I love the way proposals are made and often roads are closed with no warning, and the public are just expected to know what the alternative route is.

I spent a night at Cambodiana over the Water Festival, and getting from the night market area where I used to stay to the hotel was impossible by vehicle. We gave up and walked. Yes, we knew SQ would be closed, but no alternatives were mentioned and we didn't know the closure would affect SQ all the way almost to Naga Casino area.

Another instance of the pre-emptive vs. reactive cultures of thinking.

Apparently, the pedestrian area will eventually extend all the way to Preah Sihanouk and 19 Street. We still don't know how our guests will access the hotel.

I'd like to pedestrianise the roads around central market/ psar thmei. If they built some multi-story car parks either side of it it would be easy to add many market stalls that would pay off the cost of the parking structure quickly. Then if bus route 1 took a small detour there would be 3 bus routes running directly past the market.

orichá wrote: ↑Sun Jan 12, 2025 4:23 pm\because I am sure the walks are only going to be open at night, and maybe weekends.

From 18:00 Friday to Sunday. What will our guests do? Or do we tell them they have to go to bed at 18:00?

They won't build a tunnel because they are expensive, nobody else will pay for it and there is no way to monetise it by way of a toll (they only work with long distances or bridges with no alternative).

Any blockage of Sisowath Quay will move the traffic west to, ideally, Norodom. But Norodom has many traffic lights and gets bogged down easily. So that means St 19 will be used as a rat run, and it already gets blocked on a regular basis at peak times. It won't take much to gridlock it on a regular basis.

If you allow traffic to get near Sisowath quay when it is closed, such as the streets between street 5 and Sisowath quay, you will need to have a dedicated clear turning area to allow vehicles to turn round easily, i.e. not a 9 point turn with a man in the street waving his hands randomly. This will require strict no parking/no waiting zones at the turning zones, which requires constant strict management. So there's zero chance of that happening.

If they want to attract tourists to the Riverside area (not just the type that come here for the 'entertainment' in the riverside area) then try repairing and then thoroughly cleaning the streets on a weekly basis, and clearing and repairing the pavements/sidewalks, especially on Sisowath Quay itself, which is a disgrace for any national capital on its prime river frontage boulevard.

Introduce an empty shop tax to force landlords to rent out all the closed and dilapidated shop spaces which are either just left empty for land-banking purposes or the landlords have pie-in-the-sky rent demands. If you charge them $1000 a month for an empty shop, they will soon get it occupied with at least something, which is always better than nothing. Force commercial tenants to clean the area outside their premises up to a minimum standard. Don't allow them to block the pavement.

Install metal barriers 2ft in from the kerb and create drop-off areas. This allows transport to pick up, and drop off without completely blocking traffic flow, but not to park, and protects the pavement for pedestrians. Commercial deliveries of stock only between 6am and 3pm. This will require permanent, boots-on-the-ground management of the road, with fines being dished out constantly until they get with the program. Give 20% of the fines issued to the ticket issuer, people will line up to do the job for no salary.

If they want the Riverside to be the jewel in the crown of Phnom Penh tourism and compete with other neighbouring cities, then start acting like it and stop thinking that what is currently there is remotely acceptable to tourists who are used to far better conditions everywhere else.

Just blocking it off at arbitrary times of the week without further thought is just thick-headed and lazy, which is par for the course. It needs some well thought out corrective cosmetic surgery, not an amputation with a rusty axe.