Phahon Yothin’s overhead wires to go under
Overhead power lines and poles on eight kilometres of Phahon Yothin Road are to disappear in September.
The plan is part of the government’s roadmap for putting all existing electric wires and telecom/broadcasting cables underground in three provinces by 2020.
The roadmap targets Bangkok and the nearby provinces of Samut Prakan and Nonthaburi. The entire project, spanning 127km of 39 roads, will cost 51.7 billion baht.
Moving the cables underground in Bangkok is an effort to beautify the city as it seeks status as an Asean metropolis.
According to Chaiyong Puapongsakorn, governor of the Metropolitan Electricity Authority (MEA), the Phahon Yothin project will take about two months to bury all existing overhead power, telecom and broadcasting cables and remove all poles, starting in August.
The project on Phahon Yothin Road runs from Lat Phrao intersection to Victory Monument.
Yesterday, the MEA, the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) and the Telecommunications Association of Thailand announced a collaboration to remove all existing overhead cables and poles along Phahon Yothin Road by the end of September.
The MEA has its own underground pipeline beneath the 39 roads. The telecom and broadcasting operators will have to pay a rental rate of 18,000 baht per km per month to the MEA for placing their existing overhead cables into the MEA’s pipeline.
“Using the MEA’s underground pipeline seems to be a shortcut for the project, because the roadmap started in July last year but so far no roads have completely put all cables underground,” Mr Chaiyong said.
He said the MEA expects further collaboration on other roads, especially Sukhumvit.
Five state agencies jointly signed a memorandum of understanding in July 2016 to begin moving overhead cables underground: the MEA, TOT, the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration, the Royal Thai Police and the NBTC.
The government has urged all related state agencies to speed up the first phase in order to serve the digital economy initiative and eliminate the unsightly clutter of overhead cables.
The MEA is in charge of replacing all existing overhead power lines with underground lines, requiring an investment of 48.7 billion baht.
State telecom TOT is responsible for constructing a 3-billion-baht underground system for grouping all existing telecom and broadcasting cables into a single platform.
TOT set a rental fee of 18,000 baht per km per month.