Chamber calls for heavy duty bridges

Nov 30, 2009 News

CORRIVERTON, BERBICE – Former President and founder member of the Upper Corentyne Chamber of Commerce, David Subnauth is appealing to Government to construct only heavy duty bridges at strategic locations between Crabwood Creek and Moleson Creek in order to prevent a recurrence of Thursday’s incident.
Just after 16:00 hours on that day, the Jackson Creek Bridge collapsed under the pressure of a Hymac which was towing a low-bed trailer. The vehicles were en route to a farm at Moleson Creek and the Hymac ended up in the creek. Efforts to salvage the vehicle were still ongoing up to yesterday.
According to Mr. Subnauth, the steel-plated structure is one of five which may have been constructed by a Surinamese contractor a few years ago when the road to Moleson Creek was upgraded to an asphalted one. The fallen structure was suitable for the flow of traffic at the time it was built but things have changed and it could no longer handle the volume.
According to Mr. Subnauth, teams from the Ministry of Public Works and Transportation were on the site on Friday working around the clock. Some material was transported and a temporary structure was erected thus opening the way for the flow of some amount of traffic by Saturday.
Subnauth said no significant loss of trade or traffic resulted from the fallen bridge as a result of quick action by Government and more so, the incident occurred after 16:00 hours on Thursday, and Friday was a public holiday. The structure is not only used for direct access to the Guyana/Suriname Ferry Terminal but by farmers as well.
Mainly, the farmers would have been somewhat inconvenienced since Moleson Creek is the agricultural hub for the Upper Corentyne. Thousands of acres of land were recently taken by private sugar cane farmers. These farmlands provided the highest sugar cane yields across Guyana. Against that backdrop, several heavy duty vehicles traverse the said bridge and others like it on a daily basis as they transport fuel, farming machinery including tractors, bulldozers, draglines, fertilizer and the like to the farmlands.
Subnauth said, should the situation arise when farmers cannot transport their sugar cane via the Link Canal which connects the sugar cane farms from Moleson Creek to the new Skeldon Sugar Modernization Project, then the very roadway and bridges must be used.
He is hopeful that Prime Minister Samuel Hinds would make good the promise for a heavy duty replacement of the fallen Jackson Creek Bridge by mid 2010.
Meanwhile, Subnauth is once again calling on Government to regularize the ‘backtrack’ operations at Number Seventy-eight Village on the Corentyne. He said although they are illegal ports of entry/exit, there are benefits that are derived on a daily basis. The backtrack operations at Number Seventy-eight Village cannot only be blamed for the importation of arms and ammunition as well as illicit drugs because there is a porous border between Moleson Creek and the Corentyne Coast including Orealla. According to him, there are trails leading from Orealla to Lethem and these very paths can also be used for unlawful activities too.
Using the official port of entry/exit – Moleson Creek Ferry Terminal- is said to be a time consuming exercise and cannot permit business persons to transact their business in one day because of the schedule, but with the backtrack operations, a person is in neighbouring Suriname within 20 minutes.
“You can do your shopping and can come back within half day.”
A number of persons perished in the Corentyne River en route to Suriname using the very backtrack facilities.
“It’s a lot of risk…too risky yes and not safe, it’s illegal but it is faster.”
Subnauth said that what is needed is for the vessels plying the route to have adequate safety measures in place and adhere to all navigation rules. Mr. Subnauth has been making the call for regularized backtrack operations on many occasions dating back to 2003.

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Chamber calls for heavy duty bridges

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