The Soul of Penang

The Soul of Penang
Fast Disappearing…..Laments of a Township.

Please don’t sell Penang down the road!

Once upon a time, as recently as 5 or 6 years ago, you could take a relaxing, cooling, shaded drive up the north coast of Penang, along the sleepy rainforest teaming with local wildlife, the calls of the Langurs and Macaques hanging out, colorful birds singing on one side; and the beautiful, vast blue sea with her quiet inviting beaches on the other that Penangites and Malaysians from all over the country seeked out as their unique water playground. As a child, I remember the clear blue waters we swam in with fish visible clear to the bottom, comparable to the waters of the Greek Islands.... no more! Oh, how I weep for my beloved Penang.

This drive now has become a heavily packed, dangerous, overused utility road for developers with heavy vehicular traffic (lorries and cement trucks) that they have introduced. A curving, slope-hugging roadway that cannot be expanded to accommodate such a large increase in traffic. Many permanent residents worry about the safety of all who use this road, including cyclists and pedestrians, while motorbikes maneuver recklessly around cars and buses.

Random, chaotic, arbitrary development of every meter of hillside and seafront from Tanjong Bunga to Batu Ferringhi has become the norm. Massive high rise developments have up sprung everywhere, haphazardly, right to the edges of the main thoroughfare, the only direct roadway from town to the coastal rainforest/beach/resort areas of this beautiful island, without proper thought or planning for the consequences that come with this kind of rapid development. The steep watershed areas of Tanjong Bunga once reserved, now being developed is of great concern to its residents....what will happen to our water supply? The results of this kind of hill degradation was recently experienced in the form of flash floods by the Chee Seng Garden residents of Tanjong Bunga. We worry about the hill sliding in a heavy monsoon... a mud slide that could cause another Highland Towers or an Antarabangsa!

There are a thousand reasons not to do this to our beloved Penang especially our beach and waterfront areas which should have a unique status as a ‘Special Recreation Area’ for all, not only in the present, but also for posterity. But leaders and consortia of avarice have led Penang‘s Town and Country Planners of public good down a bad road. Worst of all, there is no demand for these high rise apartments, many are lightless at night and empty! They are being heavily marketed by ravenous developers to local “investors” of the mindset that ‘the more property you put your money in the better off you are, a kind of failsafe protection but short sighted and environmentally unsound; but also to “investors” in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Singapore, China, Australia, UK,USA etc. advertising grandiose air brushed architect designer plans which never show the real Tanjong Bunga or Batu Ferringhi of congestion that has been created. There is simply an over-supply and over-building which serves no ‘real local or imagined need’ in the saturated housing market. Development of housing should follow demand for housing, which is generally the reason for new developments.

Unchecked corporate avarice has become the motivating force above all, creating uncontrolled, socially irresponsible, and environmentally unsafe, unethical developments. The common good of the residents of Tanjong Bunga and Batu Ferringhi, and all living in Penang, has been put on the back burner, leading us rapidly to a TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS in our neighborhoods. Sometimes, the most valuable things in life cannot be measured in dollars and cents.

Our beaches belong to all of us, not the few who have built right to the sea, developers, corporations and foreign consortia building along and blocking access to the waterfront, which negate the ordinary people’s right to enjoy the beautiful beaches and seaside of Penang.

A beachside recreational park for all posterity, for all the people of Penang and her mainland, is a priority. We need public lands set aside for the well being of the people of Penang. Our State Town and Country Planning Board and our State Government in their vision for Penang must take into account the wishes of the people of Penang and all its MM2H stakeholders.

To the new Government of Penang, please listen to the cries of your people. Please don’t continue the plans made previously. Hill cutting to build shoddy structures to house absentee investor residents and serve a few developers in Penang, which may lead to death and/or property destruction in these uncertain times of increased earth tremors, must be taken seriously, and has criminal implications. It cannot be deemed “not the fault of the developer” in Penang when they come tumbling down because of such negligence.

To all those involved...Please stop the permanent environmental damage and destruction, and the permanent aesthetic degradation and “visual eye sore” of the unique Penang landscape of coastal rainforest once rich with wildlife and our dying beautiful beaches and waterfront. Let’s work together on changing this. Please get involved and FREE OUR PENANG.

Let’s keep the “Pearl of the Orient” simply that!... and not let it become the “Toilet of the Orient” (in reference to where all the human waste from Tanjong Bunga and Batu Ferringhi goes...the overflow goes into the ocean untreated in some stretches of the North Coast, we just can’t be sure which stretch!)

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar: I love not man the less, but Nature more.~ George Gordon, Lord Byron from 'Childe Harold's Pilgrimage' ~

Look deep into nature,
and then you will understand everything better.
~ Albert Einstein ~

Botanic Garden Arches Help!

Arches in the Penang Botanic Gardens in Min Of Tourism Website
Date: Tue, 08 Jun 2010 11:59:31 +0800
From: Penang Heritage Trust (PHT)
To:



The Ministry is running a survey on whether the ARCHES SHOULD BE RETAINED.

Please participate in the survey. Details of the website are as below.

Please send urgent message out to all your friends to ask them to vote and please stress that the box / answer they should tick should be the NO box

Enclosed picture of the arches.

The website is http://www.motour.gov.my/en.html

The survey is right on the main page.

They are going to use the survey as the reason to keep or not to keep.