After a trip to Sanhe, an ancient city in eastern China, Vichit Prakobgosol, president of the Association of Thai Travel Agents (ATTA) urged the Thai government to take a look at the country's pedestrian streets -- popular tourist destinations in Thailand.
The walking street in Sanhe, according to Mr Vichit, is a good example of what an authentic walking street should look like.
The effort which the Communist government used to restore this ancient town, destroyed by red guards during the Cultural Revolution in the late 1960s, can serve as an example for the Thai government to follow.
"Local officials and people can take Sanhe as a tourism model to reflect real culture and unique lifestyles, not just for the purpose of keeping cars out and letting food in," Mr Vichit said in reference to walking street projects that mushroom across Thailand.
Mr Vichit visited Sanhe from Sept 16-21 to promote Thai tourism.
Sanhe is a popular tourist site known as an ancient water town. Located in Anhui province with Shanghai to the east, the town's name is derived from the three rivers -- the Fengle River, Hangbu River and Xiaonan River -- that intersect there.
The town has existed for 2,500 years, yet many of its ancient buildings and religious items were decimated by red guards -- a young, fanatic Communist group that tried to destroy remnants of older cultures during the Cultural Revolution.
But the government has since put a lot of effort towards restoring cultural heritage sites. As a result, Sanhe has become a high-quality tourist attraction which can maintain some of its Chinese roots.
Many cities in Thailand also run walking streets like those in Sanhe to draw tourists. Yet, Mr Vichit said, walking streets in Thailand still lack unique, quaint old charm. Walking streets in Thailand appear to him more as streets turned into weekend markets, which fail to meet a true definition of tourism, he said.
"What I've seen [on walking streets in Thailand] is only the temporary closure of streets to food vendors. They're the same everywhere," Mr Vichit said, warning that having many tourists, or more correctly, shoppers, does not necessarily mean the streets are attracting visitors for their cultural value.
"I can hardly estimate how much money the Chinese government spent for this large scale restoration. It is likely to be greater than 100 million baht," Mr Vichit said.
Walking across the town is like having oneself immersed in various scenes of Chinese paintings.
Fortunately, red guards did not decimate all heritage sites.
Old city walls and ancient houses still survive and exist, giving tourists a glimpse of Sanhe's long history while newer buildings were built to match the ancient architectural styles of the Ming and Qing dynasties.
The government also preserved houses of notable local people, such as Chen-Ning Yang, a Chinese leading scientist who was awarded a Nobel Prize for physics in 1957, whose home was turned into a museum.
"These exhibits don't just result from the budget plan," said Mr Vichit. "They also need knowledge and expertise from historians, archaeologists, architects and curators to recreate a complete picture of Sanhe," he said.
"In Thailand, we have old wooden row houses and old commercial zones, but they only deteriorate, waiting to be replaced by modern buildings," Mr Vichit said.
The restoration of these buildings like those in Sanhe is costly and in his view, only the government can finance the work to make them truly reflect local culture and history, not just another street markets.
Because some provincial governors are not local governors and don't have first-hand knowledge of their jurisdiction's culture, it can be difficult for local Thai governments to develop local cultural projects that truly reflect the real flavour of communities, he said.
Meanwhile, local administrators hardly pay attention to cultural preservation projects because such initiatives take time, expertise and vision.
Building infrastructure is easier for them because those projects deliver tangible and practical results.
Redesigning tourism the way Sanhe did requires "huge budgets, big moral support and great ideas because the work will take a very long time to be fruitful," Mr Vichit said.
But without careful plans, he is worried many new tourist districts in Thailand may end up being popular but lacking cultural roots and a true community spirit.
An example is the popular Amphawa floating market in Samut Songkhram in Thailand, where despite being a popular tourist attraction, many of the establishments are run by outsiders and there are so many visitors that it can become difficult to walk through the narrow streets.
"I'm not satisfied with these things. We're losing our identity," said Mr Vichit, also an Amphawa resident.
A local resident at Sanhe in eastern China has turned his house into a shop selling local products such as dried and pickled fruits.