Bangkok, Thailand

Planning to Be Green

Bangkok's commitment to being an environmentally sustainable city dates back to 1992, when the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) undertook a series of integrated systems studies to assess the full range of environmental issues. BMA paid particular attention to developing the social processes that would ensure the effort's viability over time. Though the Asian economic crisis that struck in July of 1997 sapped the city's financial resources, little momentum was lost. Bangkok's Agenda 21 (BA21) was adopted in 1998, setting in place a 10-point plan that would guide city development for the next 20 years.

Patterned on the United Nations’ model, BA21 proposed conventional goals—improvement of the transportation network, investment in urban greening, and land use reform to provide a higher quality of life for residents—but it also promised to provide “good governance … to meet the challenges of the future.” Even as it established a broad agenda, [Page 21]Bangkok took care to translate it to the local level to ensure broad public commitment to and investment in attaining the goals.

While the city has made laudable progress in becoming a sustainable city, the combined pressures of growth and increased affluence keep moving the endpoint. Heightened awareness of the environmental threats associated with global warming has added a new layer of urgency. In response, the BMA prepared its Action Plan on Global Warming Mitigation 2007–2012 (APGWM) and adopted Bangkok 2020: Sustainable Metropolis Plan to succeed BA21.

The Challenges

The first environmental challenge taken under BA21 was a clean air campaign. The concentration of industrial activity in Bangkok coupled with the ever-increasing traffic congestion cast a filthy pall over the city. A multi-pronged approach was taken. The road network was expanded in an effort to decrease congestion. Improvements to the mass transit system were planned but were stalled for years by the financial crisis. Other programs were initiated, including phasing out two-stroke motorcycle engines, which produce particularly noxious tailpipe emissions. The taxi fleet was converted from running on conventional gasoline to cleaner-burning liquid petroleum gas. Perhaps most significantly, automobile emission standards were adopted that were even more strict than those set by the European Community. In combination, these actions reduced small particulate pollution by 47 percent over the course of a decade.

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