Branch Road, De Hoop, Mahaica, which was rehabilitated less than two years ago by H Nauth & Sons Construction Company has already started to deteriorate and residents have expressed disappointment.
When this newspaper visited the area last week, residents said there had been a huge hole at the centre of the road and apart from it being an encumbrance to traffic it had posed a traffic hazard.
One man said he decided to fill the hole with an “old tyre, bricks and quarry because I realised the danger. If we allow the road to go more bad is we gon punish.”
He said too the hole was there for a few weeks and “no one wanted to take the trouble of fixing it. People who don’t know the road could make accident in the nights and die…”
The man also complained that the road was too narrow and drivers sometimes have to pull over to the edge, to allow other vehicles to pass, resulting in some sections “caving in and even breaking.”
Other residents said that persons experienced difficulty navigating the narrow road and end up “missing the turn and toppling. As soon as you slip off the edge, you can turn over.”
The resident who patched the hole said the beginning of the road was not as bad as the end and he assumed that the contractor was in a hurry to leave the area.
This newspaper observed that the road was indeed narrow and that at one section the dirt below was washing away and causing the road to break.
Harripaul, a resident of Little Biaboo where the road ends, told this newspaper that provision was not made for vehicles to turn on the road. He said when residents hired trucks to transport sand and other items they had a problem finding a “turning point and they refuse to come in again.”
He recalled that while the road was under construction residents kept telling the contractors that “the road should be wider but they said they can’t do anything about…”
He said Minister of Transport Robeson Benn visited the area on two occasions, just after the construction started, but he did not stop to speak to anyone.
“Then when the road was about to complete we [residents] wrote a letter to the President [Bharrat Jagdeo] for the road to extend about 75 rods more. He come and keep a meeting and tell we that the piece would be fixed but the road finish and the piece still left just like that.”
Harripaul said Benn had also arranged to meet farmers and residents, and over 40 of them waited at the prearranged venue at the date and time set, but the minister did not show up.
Another resident said, “We are living here and I think it is right that they tell we how they building the road. We are not satisfied with the way it was done.”
Contacted, Regional Chairman of Region Five, Harrinarine Baldeo, told this newspaper that government was aware that a three-mile stretch of the road was poorly built. He said a team from the Ministry of Public Works had visited to assess the situation.
The chairman said about seven miles of the road – up to Number Ten, Mahaica – was in better condition because that part “was made of crusher run and had a solid foundation. We also maintained it every year.”
He admitted that the rest of the road was narrow but said the contractors had to build on an existing “dam.” He said because there were drains and rice fields on both sides, the road could not have been wider. Filling the drains to make the road wider would have been very costly.
Besides, he said, in order to make the road wider, government would have had to encroach on private land. He said if the residents were willing to give up their land, the region could expand the road in the future.
According to Baldeo, the issue of extending the road for 75 rods was being looked at but funds were not available at the moment.
With regard to the huge potholes, he said the section “had a lot of mud and the contractors had to build from scratch. There was also a lot of rain during the construction… and there is no proper compacting of the road.”
In the meantime, the chairman appealed to residents to “care the road and have good reason and sense when using it.”
He said he has received complaints about drivers speeding on the road as well as of some residents “drying paddy on half of the road and when they do that drivers have to use the parapet and that cause the road to damage more.”
He pointed out that tractors “bring out a lot of mud from the farms” and that also contributed to the deterioration of the road.
With regard to the road having no turning point, Baldeo said, “We cannot have turning point if we do not have land. Residents have to work that out, how to turn…”
