A hub of slackness - Students on the loose, misbehave at the Half-Way Tree Transport Centre
Published:Sunday | October 17, 2010 | 12:00 AM
Tyrone Reid, Sunday Gleaner Reporter
More than a year after stakeholders met to put an end to the slackness that was taking place at the government-operated Half-Way Tree Transport Centre, it remains a hub of indecency and violence.
Daily, students from Corporate Area high schools loiter in the transportation centre after school, fraternising lewdly and fighting.
The lewd and sometimes illegal acts are done with disregard for the adults who use the facility.
One year ago, there were reports that students had been caught having sex in the bathrooms at the transportation centre.
But more stringent bathroom rules have seemingly put an end to that practice.
However, the gyrating, 'daggering' and other lewd acts by students in the transportation hub each day are as close to sexual intercourse as they can get.
It seems arriving at the transportation centre after school is the highlight of the day for many of these students who use the facility to fix their hair, wash their faces, and neaten their clothes.
If it were not for the vigilant ancillary staff at the hub, its water bill would have ballooned because the students want to wash their faces as much as they want to touch each other. And, they touch each other a lot.
Contact sport
Loitering in the hub is like a contact sport because many of the students seemingly have difficulty keeping their hands off members of the opposite sex.
According to a policeman stationed at the post in the transportation centre, some of the students get there at 1:30 p.m. and do not leave until 6:30 p.m.
During a visit to the bus park last week, The Sunday Gleaner team noticed that while the students loitered, there was a lot of hugging and touching taking place. Public displays of affection seem to be the order of the day among the minors.
There was no music in the hub, but a khaki-clad boy was seen putting some contemporary dance moves on a schoolgirl who was pinned against the railing.
Similar acts were being carried out by other students in the uniforms of some of the oldest and most respected high schools in the Corporate Area.
Mitchell McLean, a veteran member of the Island Special Constabulary Force, who is stationed at the hub, lamented that in the 26 years he has worked in law enforcement, he had enjoyed his job until he was assigned to the bus park.
McLean said the children's crude behaviour has pushed him to the brink several times.
"The schoolers dem ah di problem. The only time I feel good is when school is on holiday. Mi never know mi coulda neva waan come ah work," said the straight-talking cop.
"They rob, steal, kiss, and, if you take your eye off of them, they have sex in the bathroom," the policeman lamented.
He explained that the older students preyed on the younger ones. Intimidation tactics are applied to extort money and rob the mobile phones of the young students. McLean said the "extortionists in training" flee when they see the police coming.
The students are a terror even to the adults who use the bus park.
"The adults are actually afraid to come in here. Ah dem (students) own it," McLean said.
Borderlines
The policeman said the girls are no more principled than the boys. They, too, have drawn borderlines that girls from other schools cross at their own peril.
"They war and tear up each other's clothes and fight over man. It really bad," said the visibly frustrated policeman. "Mi ask myself, where are the parents?"
A cache of home-made and factory-manufactured weapons has been seized by the police who patrol the bus park.
Last week, McLean showed The Sunday Gleaner his car trunk, which contained two plastic crates with a plethora of weapons, including knives, machetes, scissors, and ice picks.
One of the ice picks was so long it could pierce through two persons and probably have space for a third if they were standing close to each other.
The policeman opined that there might be a need for more buses to get the children out of the hub quicker, but even then he was not sure that would solve the problem.
He might be right. It did not matter how many buses pulled into the park; most of the students did not budge. They were too busy in each other's faces and ears.
McLean revealed that students from as far away as Linstead, St Catherine, travel to the hub just to fraternise.
Park jampacked
Our news team arrived at the bus park at 3:42 p.m., and it was jampacked with students - practically every Corporate Area high school was represented.
At 5:10 when we made our exit, nothing much had changed. The students were still fraternising. Many of them did not seem to have the desire to go home as they were rather busy doing nothing.
But adults who use the transport centre on a daily basis argued that what we were seeing was not new.
In April last year, Esther Tyson, principal of Ardenne High School, in a Sunday Gleaner column, referenced a meeting with stakeholders involved in the operation of the centre and representatives from various schools.
She said the number of fights and other antisocial behaviours by students in the transport centre were discussed with a view to finding solutions.
"We were told that almost every day there was a fight, not only between boys, but also between girls who are fighting over a boy or a man. We were shown pictures of weapons taken from students by the police who monitor the centre.
"We understood how serious the situation was when the managers pointed out that during the school holidays, the centre was a peaceful, pleasant place, but when school was in session, the atmosphere became tense and a hub of conflict because of the behaviour of some students," Tyson wrote.