Waltham Park ‘water-logged’ Road … again!

THE EDITOR, Madam:

On Monday, vehicles were again forced to detour off the main in the vicinity of the Olivet Gospel Hall at 43b Waltham Park Road, St Andrew.

Let us do the maths. It is so simple that even the suckling on the breast understands.

Here we go!

A filthy nearby gully that falls under the road, plus saturated pothole-riddled road, plus taxi men blocking the road with old tyres, equals National Works Agency coming on television to state that they are aware of the problem, plus the road is fixed, equals a cycle to be repeated in a couple of months when the taxi men block the road again.

Solution – recurring decimal!

STAR newspaper writer Simone Morgan-Lindo’s article ‘Cops, cabbies unite to fix roadway’ published on March 2, 2021 outlines the persistent problems facing this highly traversed patch of road. According to the story, “Taxi operators who ply the Waltham Park to downtown Kingston route and cops from Hunts Bay Police Station joined forces yesterday to repair a damaged roadway in a section of Waltham Park Road.”

We cannot pin this one on the Queen on the basis that Jamaica needs to become a republic like Barbados. What of the Master Builders Association, our engineers and urban planners? Is it that there is no policy in place to monitor road repairs at intervals and to take the necessary corrective actions? Is it that we lack heavy-duty gully-sucking and cleaning equipment in Jamaica? Is it that only the Chinese contractors can solve these kinds of problems?

This situation is untenable. Jamaicans deserve better!

JOAN FRANCIS