More than a sinkhole

This partial collapse caused traffic to back up to the extent that the routine trip home for motorists ended up taking several hours, with even traffic between the capital and Chaguanas being backed up for miles on both the Solomon Hochoy and Churchill Roosevelt Highways.

Blame fell onto the Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA) for a burst water-pipe eroding the subsoil under the highway, leading to a cave-in. WASA to their credit immediately put a statement to alert the general public to the fact of a disruption at the site and to advise motorists to follow guidance from local police officers on how to proceed.

As it turned out the authorities quite rightly allowed motorists to use the Priority Bus Route so as to divert some of the burden away from the Churchill Roosevelt Highway.

Eventually everyone would have gotten home but at the cost of a frustrating snarl in traffic that was also potentially unsafe not from the threat of soil subsidence but rather from what has happened in the past: bandits seeking subsistence from motorists.

A geological issue could have quickly transformed itself into a security issue.

By our count last Friday’s sinkhole was the third of its kind at that area since 2012. One sinkhole incident occurred on September 6, 2012, that was eventually fixed at a cost of $6.7 million. Another occurred on September 27, 2016, apparently caused by a ruptured sewer line, which gouged out an eight-foot diameter hole.

The area is a complex mix of reclaimed lands, seasonal flooding, high and low tides, and variable water-pressure in an aging infrastructure of water-mains, all possibly underlined by occasional geological activity. This obviously calls for an in-depth inspection via some mechanism such as ultrasound for monitoring the bedrock at our nation’s key arteries of transport chiefly highways to seek to detect what is happening underground and to advise on a more permanent solution.

But there is another fundamental to what happened on Friday and it surrounds the question of the evacuation of our city in the event of a major emergency. If a relatively benign sinkhole in a small area could create such despair among motorists, are we not a sitting duck for potential havoc from a more forceful event, God forbid, such as a hurricane or earthquake or even man-made incident? Calls were made for a capital city evacuation plan even during the Patrick Manning Administration.

If this is not in the works as yet, then Fridays incident reminds us that there is urgent need for such a plan to be crafted to instruct what should happen whether the occurrence is a simple sinkhole or a much more complex natural or other disaster.

The dearth of entry points to the capital city means that in an emergency these must be utilised with maximum efficiency. Agencies such as WASA and the police must be on their game in a crisis, but will be greatly helped by a pre-existing evacuation plan for scenarios ranging from sinkhole to storm to insurgency.

So whether it is because of sinkholes, or congestion due to panic over an impending hurricane or the elation over the national football team qualifying for the World Cup, we have experienced traffic chaos too many times before. We sincerely hope that sinkholes can be detected and remedied before they create havoc, and that the long overdue emergency evacuation plans can be put in place. Indeed, last Friday’s occurrence was about more than a sinkhole