Congestion crisis at Gasparillo

THE EDITOR: Gasparillo’s quiet urbanisation over the last five years has become overwhelming. This burgeoning southern community parallels today development seen in Marabella especially, as in any other part of the country. Compelling evidence of this growth and the need for immediate attention to all that is happening though is paramount to Gasparillo’s future.

Housing developments in the last few years at Springlands, Ragoobar Lands, Caratal, Charles Street, Reform Village, Bonne Aventure, Johnson Street, Poona, Whiteland, Ben Lomond, Harmony Hall and Williamsville have drastically altered Gasparillo’s once sleepy rural landscape. In addition, a host of commercial undertakings and entrepreneurial ventures on the Bonne Aventure Main Road, at Harmony Hall and on the Guaracara- Tabaquite Road have brought stout, if not vexing, challenges to authorities alike. For example, traffic congestion at peak times (6.30 am - 9.30 am and 2.30 pm - 7 pm) into and out of Gasparillo is any motorist or commuter’s nightmare. This fact can be appreciated if only because of the half-hour head start required now to get out of Gasparillo especially on mornings. Yet, just think of a life-threatening emergency or anything similar during these periods which requires one to get to a hospital! Sorry, we have no 911 nor do we have helicopters here!

An exercise conducted two years ago by students of the Gasparillo Composite School revealed that well over a thousand vehicles traffic through Gasparillo Junction every morning between 6 am and 9.30 am. This statistic excludes traffic destined for Marabella via the Gasparillo Highway turnoff and traffic similarly bound for Marabella on the Guaracara-Tabaquite Road. However, this traffic, both on mornings and on evenings has become perennially challenging and understandably infuriating. Limited, or to be more precise, non existent alternate routes compound this shortcoming. The answer though, is definitely not in the installation of traffic lights as this will only exacerbate the problem. To wit, on any given day that security personnel at the Petrotrin Entrance North (at the Pointe-a-Pierre highway turnoff) choose to undertake diligent vehicular searches, traffic backs up for miles on every roadway nearest to Gasparillo Junction, including the northbound and southbound Pointe-a-Pierre exits of the Sir Solomon Hochoy Highway.

Newspaper, fish, doubles and fruit vending around this busy intersection, an inconsistent Police presence at peak intervals and those known indiscretions of many PH and taxi drivers are factors which also lend to this daily commuting ordeal. But the patience of the Gasparillo community, motorists and commuters alike has become threadbare. It is only a matter of time before protest action, as suggested and prescribed by a former distinguished government official, becomes a reality. However, this and all other forms of retaliatory, negative redress measures can be alleviated if only wisdom can be seen in the provision of two exit ramps, one off the Sir Solomon Hochoy Highway onto the Guaracara-Tabaquite Road at the Harmony Hall overpass and the other, from the Guaracara-Tabaquite Road onto the Sir Solomon Hochoy Highway (south). This will effectively address and solve the vexing, daily congestion where all traffic amalgamate at present in Gasparillo. Let’s not wait, Mr Franklin Khan, until the situation erupts into a frenzy of protest demonstrations.

JAHMADAR CASSIE
Gasparillo