Ubon Ratchathani News & Development

[SantiSuk 3,382]

... and unlike the bulk of AA's flights the Utapao route can be quite competitively priced v Nok Air and Lion to Don Meuang.

 

My daughter had to get to Chonburi at 4 hours notice on Sunday. Lion Air - only one of its 3 remaining flights had space and the ticket cost was 3,500 baht. Nok had space on 3 remaining flights, but the cheapest seat was approx 2,500 baht (all these prices one-way). A mate reminded me of AA's daily afternoon flight to Utapao and sure enough the 15:20 was still showing availability at 3 hours notice priced at 1,550 baht. Have heard of friends using it at sub-700 baht prices

[SantiSuk 3,382]

Hooray. Highway 2178 south of the existing four lane section from Warin to Samrong and the bit around Benchalak leading down to Highway 24  is finally showing signs of being widened. Hopefully this is to complete a four lane route all the way from Ubon to Bangkok, providing a more direct cut accross from lower Sisaket/Surin up to Meuang Ubon than the old Highway 24 which goes a long way round via Det Udom.

 

Hooray for us in Lower Sisaket since it makes the regular trip up to Ubon a little less of a hassle. Presumably hooray for Ubonites as this will presumably become the route of choice to most points west and Bangkok for Ubonites, rather than 'the northern route, via Sisaket/KhuKhan or Sisaket/Surin/Prasat. This piece should knock 15 mins off journey times and mean Ubon Ring Road to central Bangkok all 4-lane and with the number of traffic lights countable on one hand (ok not quite, as Prakonchai and Nang Rong seem determined to add stop-lights every couple of years!).

 

There was  a bet going around the Black Dog Bar in Kantharalak that Yingluk's instruction of several years ago to "widen 24 to Ubon", which was honoured by the military government, would be taken literally by office-based national highway design wallahs in Bangkok and the road via a Det dogleg would end up being widened rather than the more direct, but not 24-named route via Benchalak and Samrong. That was only fuelled by the lack of evidence of any action on the 2178 and a bit of what is now emerging as probably drainage work at the Kantaralak end of the Det Udom route. 

  

Edited January 22, 2018 by SantiSuk

[MrTrip 534]

Was quite surprised to see the extent of the improvements planned for 24 during our recent visit to Kantalak. We’ve enjoyed our annual update on the progress over the last 10 or 12 years but to be honest I never thought the 4 lane section would get out in the sticks as far as Kantalak.

We took our normal day trip to Ubon and my father in law was a bit surprised that I took the Det Udom route all the way on 24.

On the way back we took the more direct route across country with the normal night driving issues. I’m not sure what time difference there is between the 2 routes??

I wonder how many more years before the 4 lanes reach Ubon???


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[SantiSuk 3,382]

Maybe as little as 2-3 years I reckon. When widening gets going on the 24 project (which this is probably part of) it happens extraordinarily quickly in Thailand. the 140km section from Prasat to north east of Kantharalak ('Ubon Rd' at the Chan Yai intersection with 24) is well on the way to completion having started (it seems like) only 18 months ago.

 

If precedent on the 24 project is followed a major phase all starts with only a couple of clicks being scraped out at the sides with no project announcement boards and then suddenly seems like half of Isaan is being dug up! Dunno what will happen to those many hundred (thousands?) of dirt trucks and heavy scrapers when it's all completed. 

[MrTrip 534]

I would guess the heavy plant would go onto the next project as there appears to be hundreds of kilometres ready for widening all across Issan.

 

I’ve always admired the planning involved when the 2 lanes are built but with electric poles etc placed in the 4 or even 6 lane positions.

 

If only we could plan like that in the UK

 

 

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[SantiSuk 3,382]

Yes - whoever was responsible for the system of allocating land as government/utilities on the side of strategic highways and some minor roads several decades ago, they should be erecting statues to him/her/them 

 

I think it was done as a national policy in some major land reform several decades ago, but would like to know more of its provenance. Actually the bit that this thread is about is noticeably relatively narrow re utilities/govt land and they will have to shoe-horn 4 lanes in I suspect. I had thought that might have been a reason why we might not get the widening done for 2178 until money could be found to buy paddy for a virgin route. Another reason to suspect we might have ended up with a crazy and useless dog-leg route via Det Udom.

[MrTrip 534]

From memory (and it really should be clearer as it was only 5 weeks ago) I think the 4 lane widening is happening way past the 2178 junction suggesting that the Det Udom route would be 4 lanes all the way.

As you mention, the 2178 would be tricky to widen


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[SantiSuk 3,382]

Er ... I think you and I may be talking at cross purposes then Mr Tripp. This thread is about the widening of the 2178, which has just commenced. No-one uses the route via Det Udom (even now without widening) to get to Ubon from points west of Kantharalak, since that involves going the long way round a pythagerous triangle in which the 2178 is the hypotenuse and Det is the 90 degree corner.

 

See attached Google map. 2178 cuts straight across.

 

Perhaps they are also widening the 24 around Det, but that's not for the kind of through traffic I'm referring to - that would be for local south Ubon province traffic. 

highway 24 in the kantharalak det udom and ubon ratchathani areas.pdf

[MrTrip 534]

We are talking about the same roads[emoji817]
As I said, maybe I imagined it but I thought the 24 road widening went past the 2178 junction??? Maybe I’m wrong?‍♀️?‍♀️?‍♀️

That map shows perfectly how much farther the Det Udom route is. No wonder my father in law thought I was a ting tong falang. I just like the view[emoji1419]


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[MrTrip 534]

And you lost me with the hippopotamus ???


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[ubonrthai 302]

The new overpass that will go over the train tracks between Ubon and Sisaket is moving along. This pic is from a few days ago but there were probably a hundred construction workers out there today for a ceremony.

[ubonrthai 302]

The white tiger that died last year at the zoo was poisoned and if I’m reading it right, 3 people were arrested trying to sell the skin for 20,000b. [emoji1361]

http://news.thaipbs.or.th/content/269931


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[ubonrthai 302]

Email from AirAsia "We regret to inform you that AirAsia flight FD3378 scheduled to depart from Ubon Ratchathani (UBP) to Chiang Mai (CNX) from 25March 2018 onward has been CANCELLED."

 

The subject line says "Urgent! AirAsia Flight FD3378 (UBP-CNX) will no longer be operated from 25 March 2018 onward."

[NiwPix 426]

Yes, and I heard that the Utapao route got cancelled as well


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[chris26be 7]

5 minutes ago, NiwPix said:

Yes, and I heard that the Utapao route got cancelled as well


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You are probably right: no fares available from 25 March onwards.