Malik Watkins's Bloglines

On the Island of Penang, thought I would go check out the Ocean Front…Now it is rare in my travels that I will just straight blast a place.  And, in my travels I have been in some quite interesting places.  This place – Strait Quay:

Don’t even Bother!!  Many of the hotels will offer you a free shuttle ride…keep in mind – you pay for what you get…if it’s free…then there is a reason!!  Putting on my City & Regional Planning Hat…this development completely ignored the concept of agglomeration economies…meaning if one group is in demand..then you build around it, put up something around it, hang out around it…and you will benefit from the demand they are experiencing…not in this place.  This is something I’ve seen in other places, where you go to an international location and they specifically minimize the indigenous or local influence…this is for the folks that need Australia or Europe or the locals who want that kind of treat.  Personally, I am not going to fly 32 hours to look in the mirror…I can do that at home…I want the local flavor!! Now, in the back of it you can get some nice shots of the harbor, but you don’t have to come here to get that you can get that down the street…and not run the risk of boring yourself to death…ugh…hope they figure that part out….moving on…

The Ocean View:

With that said, the Ocean Front potential is through the roof.  You can see downtown, the mountains, ships in the harbor, but, you can also see the efforts they have taken to limit local interaction here…a lesson could be taken from places like Panama…where people, locals and tourists, flood the ocean front to get a taste of the local food, experience culture and just interact…lots of unfilled potential…the epitome of an inorganic experience…and so with that said…forced the shuttle driver to make an exception…”must leave NOW”…he wasn’t to happy, but he had to know…so back to where the organic is prolific 🙂