(Trinidad Guardian) The floods that wreaked havoc on the country’s infrastructure and cost taxpayers millions of dollars over the last few months have raised debate about the quality of work that has been done by the Ministry of Works and Transport and contractors.
An example is the Manzanilla-Mayaro Road which was severely damaged in November, eight years after the Ministry of Works and Transport spent $30 to $40 million to repair the damage done at that time due to structural breaches that occurred as a result of inclement weather.
UK-based, Trinidad-born chartered engineer and academic Dr Kiran Tota-Maharaj, who chaired a conference on water management at the University of the West Indies, St Augustine, last week, told the Sunday Guardian that people or companies who get state contracts should have those projects monitored independently by professional associations to prevent corruption and waste of taxpayers’ money.
President of the Association of Professional Engineers of T&T (APETT) Dr Chris Maharaj agreed with Tota-Maharaj, saying that APETT has over 1,000 members, and they are willing to assist the Government and contractors who undertake public infrastructure work in ensuring that quality work is done within time.
“I agree that when you are dealing with any large contracts, multi-million dollar contracts, especially public infrastructure, there is always a need for a third party as an oversight mechanism like a professional association. You have the Government that has its wish, You have the contractor that wants to do the job at the lowest price possible to generate more profits. Of course, that’s understandable as they are running a business,” he said.
But Maharaj believes there needs to be “an unbiased entity that should be there to ensure the contractor carries out quality and standardised work.” He said there aren’t specialists to have that oversight at times within government institutions. “That’s where associations like APETT come in as an oversight mechanism, especially when public money is spent.”
Commenting on contractors doing work for the Government that has to be corrected or upgraded soon after, Maharaj said, “There are standards for engineering structures in the industry. There are standards for drainage, standards for roads. When something goes wrong, a lot of factors come into play. Was the right material used? Was the right process used? There are other factors that are coming into play like climate change.”
He blamed the flooding on climate change but also on man-made causes.
“Until a full root-cause analysis is done, we would not know all the factors involved in that Manzanilla road and stretch. There’s the effect of climate change that exacerbates the intensity, duration and frequency of rainfall. We are seeing the effects of climate change, but we need to refer to data to confirm to say in the last four or five years there has been an increase in rainfall. When people do things unlawfully, when a person diverts a river flow into his estate for agriculture purposes, and also illegal quarrying,” Maharaj said.
To counter problems of flooding and other challenges like poor work done, he proposed stakeholders working together which include academia, the Government and industries to get the best outcomes.
“We need to have more co-operation. The public needs to get involved to make sure that the solutions that these three entities arrive at are beneficial.”
Although declining to give specific examples, he said there was always “room for improvement” in the public work that the Government carries out like roads, drainage and bridges.
“We are not the only country to incur cost overruns. It’s not something unique to T&T. We have the coming procurement legislation that will assist in this area and the Government can rely on professional associations like APETT.”
Planning development is critical
Professor of Civil Environmental Engineering at the University of South Florida, Maya Trotz, who took part in the water management conference at UWI last week, told the Sunday Guardian that although she is a foreigner, based on what she has seen and heard, there need to be better-planned developments that do not hinder waterways when it rains heavily and inevitably floods.
“It’s not just developing countries, as we in Florida are building on the wetlands like never before. There must be people who are aware of these issues and want to get into the decision-making process on policy matters. They will champion these issues. Also, the voters must be aware of these issues and can use their votes.
“People want larger houses, and better cities and communities, but they have to plan the spaces. Are people encroaching on agricultural lands? Are these new areas for housing flood prone? They must be planned.”
She listed several factors which contribute to flooding which include climate change and unplanned development.
“It’s difficult to manage all that water and when you layer on the development you are reducing ways in which water can be absorbed. I think there’s quite a lot of development that’s going on that maybe is not paying attention to how things should work. I see it in T&T.
“There are people with yards, and they put concrete over them. Through this, you are reducing your pervious soils and the ability of the ware to infiltrate. So now, you have a lot of run-offs. If you don’t have proper drainage, to deal with the run-off and there’s heavy rainfall, the run-off will help to flood your area.”
She spoke about a meeting with soca artiste Collis Duranty who she met at a fundraiser last week, and he told her about floods that his area in Bamboo experienced.
“He told me that he had never seen such floods before. He said the water was at three feet in his apartment, but other places got hit even worse and cars were destroyed. I am not saying there was negligence on the part of the authorities in this case, but he said that residents had to do their own intervention.”
She also warned about the costs involved when there is no proper planning and the result is flooding and damage to infrastructure.
“It is costly. If you are a business, and you are developing property in a space that’s not safe, then you are comprising safety. At some time, the insurance industry will do a pushback. Then they will start calling for better building codes, that your roof needs to be strapped, and they can’t afford payouts.
Sinanan defends the work of his ministry
Meanwhile, Minister of Works and Transport Rohan Sinanan, in an interview with the Sunday Guardian two weeks ago, defended the work that his ministry does.
Sinanan said that although they have to return to rebuild some parts of the Manzanilla-Mayaro Road which was badly damaged by floods, he denied that the work done on that roadway in 2014 was poor or that there were any major technical failures from that time.
“What the engineers are telling me is that they need to do more designs and move more water out of the area. The road actually broke when the water crossed the road. Once you put water on the sand like that, the sand eventually channels and pulls everything from under the road and that’s why the road collapsed. The force and velocity of the water were like a river crossing the road. It was like ten rivers.”
The topography of the area, he said, limits what could be done to solve some of those problems.
“Remember, there is a limitation on how much work you can do because of the nature of the area. It is an area where you cannot do any major set of construction like embankments. In 2014, the plan was to do some work to reinstate the road but the rainfall that we got now was significantly more than then.”
He also said people must also look at the cost factor involved.
“You could engineer for whatever situation, but there is a cost involved. You could build what you want there, but you have to look at the cost of the infrastructure and whether you will be permitted to do something like that. You could put a freeway for that entire road, but then you have to look at the cost. There are engineering solutions to everything, but the cost is something any Government must take into consideration,” Sinanan said.
He added that in 2014 there were four breaches or breakaways of the roadway, while there are 16 this time and some parts are still under water.
“Looking back, one of the major challenges was land acquisition because there were a lot of lands where the breaches were that they could not have moved in to do work on. This time we are taking a little bit more time to make sure we come up with more suitable solutions.
“We are focusing on bringing back connectivity now. We saw what happened in 2014 and the engineers will come up with a solution that betters that. Engineering globally is being tested by climate change, we now have to come up with better solutions.”
Prof Winston Suite, speaking to the Sunday Guardian recently, described the
Manzanilla-Mayaro road situation as a disaster waiting to happen and said we need the best and brightest minds to come up with a solution for the problem
Sinanan was again contacted last week for comments on concerns about contractor inefficiency in public works and cost overruns, but he did not answer his phone.
