Ronald Thwaites | Self-induced chaos

Road fatalities in 2019 have exceeded 400 and the year has the usually perilous holiday season still to endure.

We don’t hear much about the thousands who are injured, maimed, all becoming a burden to the State and their families, all forfeiting some measure of productivity. Then there is the cost of repairing or replacing damaged infrastructure and causing insurance premiums to climb.

So we wring our hands and, only sometimes, our hearts. There follows the accustomed bleating about the soon-come, never-come revised Road Traffic Act, which, when the regulations are completed (whenever that will be), is supposed to be the most powerful measure to recreate order on the roads.

After that comes talk about cameras, more traffic cops and well-intentioned but likely futile systems to prosecute holders of multiple tickets.

All of the above are necessary but insufficient. Tell the truth. There must be close to 800,000 motor vehicles on Jamaican roads. Under present policies, that number will exceed a million in a few years.

This year, the bill for imported petroleum products will be higher than the value of our entire merchandise exports. This is absolute madness, no matter how many tourists and remittance dollars there are to plug the hard currency gap.

It remains easier to ‘trus’ a criss car than it is to get credit to plant five acres of any export crop. The expensive and welcome new roads will be congested in short order, even as the Jamaica Urban Transit Company wallows in perpetual bankruptcy and the promised train revival remains Mike Henry’s retirement dream.

Can somebody please tell us what proportion of our savings in the banks and credit unions are devoted to motor vehicle loans, all requiring foreign exchange for acquisition and maintenance? Is it any surprise that Andrew Holness got such a welcome in Tokyo last week since Jamaica contributes so consistently to help rid their economy of unwanted vehicles?

We had better just face sordid reality for 2020 and beyond. The extent of the Government’s transport policy is the legitimation of the free-for-all chaos that we now experience throughout the country.

Controlling a ‘cyar’ is the recourse of every displaced worker, the hustle of lower-paid permanent employees with a Diaspora connection, and the aspiration of most underachieving high-school graduates.

With a car, one can generate cash flow, get girls (“yu drive”? is the first question any hot girl will ask a guy looking something), and have a sense of freedom, even as you ignore insurance coverage, dilly-dally through traffic and keep a ‘big change’ on you to lubricate outcomes if the authorities stop you.

What the prime minister and the minister know but won’t acknowledge is that this public policy has infected the society with a now irreversible cancer of corruption and disorder in public transportation.

Even now, any number of drivers are anticipating the good money to come from the electoral machines for their services on and before election day and are ready to repay with their votes the ‘anybody-can-get-a-road-licence’ regimen of the last three years. Brilliant!

Thousands of operators have never undergone a thorough course of driver education. An uncounted number driving complex articulated vehicles, let alone the 650-plus-cc scud missiles called motorcycles, cannot read or write, have no insurance, but have a hearty sense of invincibility and impunity on the road.

Notice, also, the growing practice of driving with one hand in heavy traffic at high speeds as well as the ubiquitous spliff that has become part of the style.

What happened to the requirement for driver uniforms that lasted for no more than three weeks? Many drivers are not emotionally stable enough to hold a driver’s permit. ‘Faget’ the talk about rider helmets.

For the unruly, this is a glimpse of ‘prassperty’. What else is there in this increasingly unequal society? This is upward mobility. Next stop, the visa line.

DELUSIONARY

Our history should have taught us that economic enablement without order is unsustainable and robs everybody of inclusive growth, despite the appearance of easy convenience.

Hopes that the ‘new’ but already-outdated Road Traffic Act or the presence of cameras at every intersection will solve the reality of self-induced road chaos are delusionary.

The purpose of this article is to set before us the gravity of the situation that apparently eludes its chauffeur-driven authors with their outriders and sirens, even as it saps the pockets and productivity of the rest of us.

An immediate and significant way to begin remedying the chaos is the honest and more rigorous training of new drivers and riders, and the recertifying of all licence holders whenever convicted and, in any event, every 10 or 15 years.

This must include not only evaluating technical expertise, but psychological and emotional capacities and should be led by the HEART Trust/NTA.

Could there be an explanation why the Road Safety Council and the insurance companies have not adopted such a proposal? What are they really proposing that would be as effective?

Ronald Thwaites is member of parliament for Kingston Central. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com