New Beginning for St. Thomas

Already, the year 2024 is shaping up to be the dawn of a new era in St. Thomas, with significant improvements in the road infrastructure set to attract major investments to the eastern parish.

The Government’s larger-than-life Southern Coastal Highway Improvement Project (SCHIP) is now at an advanced stage and this has meant many kilometres of four-lane roadways, smooth asphalted surfaces, stoplights, streetlights, and scenic views.

JIS News spoke with some of the residents and natives of the area who are all singing high praises for the current state of the thoroughfare, particularly from Morant Bay to Kingston, and how this has improved their lives.

Kareem Walker is a regular user of the route, as he is currently employed in Kingston and travels for work each day.

He is today breathing a sigh of relief at the state of the roads, which is a major improvement over the conditions that existed before and during the highway project.

“The road infrastructure has been improved drastically and the experience has been good, so far. It now takes less time to traverse to and from Kingston,” he explains.

Illustrating, Mr. Walker says that his journey to work used to take approximately two and a half hours.

That same journey has now been slashed in half and currently averages just over an hour.

The 26-year-old resident, who has been living in the parish all his life, points out that the most impressive feature of all, in his opinion, is the four-lane roadways between Albion and Bull Bay, as these have created less traffic and have added to the reduced travel time.

In addition, the wear and tear to his vehicle may now be a thing of the past, as he explains that, “I recently serviced the vehicle due to the improvement of the road and I am currently monitoring the state of the vehicle, but it should be much better from here on.”

Overall, the new roads bode well for the parish, says Mr. Walker, as he believes that more persons will be attracted to St. Thomas, resulting in short and long-term economic benefits.

“More money will be in circulation and there will be more opportunities, as investors and businesses will be incentivised to operate within the parish,” he predicts.

Entrepreneur, Ivy Buckley, is another offspring of the soil and was born and raised in St. Thomas.

Currently residing in Kingston, Ms. Buckley tells JIS News that before now, the road conditions in her home parish had prevented her from making regular visits, and handicapped some of her close, personal relationships with family and friends.

“It was depressing thinking of going back home and travelling on the roads. Even when I started driving, it got more depressing because I started thinking of the damage to my vehicle, so it caused me to delay my journey back home,” she details.

As a result, Ms. Buckley says she grew apart from her community, explaining that “even though I would want to go back and talk to some of the younger folks and help them with their schoolwork, it really made me depressed because I no longer wanted to do those things due to the journey”.

Beaming as she speaks of the contrast between those times and now, Ms. Buckley tells JIS News, “Seeing the road now, everybody I tell about it.”

“Everybody that I am having a conversation with, I would tell them how easy it is to go home to St. Thomas on the new road. That’s my opening line in a conversation nowadays. It was just so convenient, long overdue, and a breath of fresh air. The view? Oh my gosh, Ochi (Ocho Rios) has nothing on us. I had to stop and take a picture of the view and I saw multiple persons stopping and taking a picture of the view,” she recalls.

An entrepreneur, Ms. Buckley says she is looking forward to even more trips to the parish to visit her loved ones, as home now feels like “just a stone’s throw away”.

“It’s like I was holding my breath all these years and finally now being able to exhale and relax on my journey home; it no longer feels depressing or stressful,” she says.

Cosmetologist in the Seaforth area, Shellonise Haye Noyan, lives and works within the parish, which means she only uses the Morant Bay to Harbour View leg of the highway from time to time, when the need arises.

Her latest journey on the route, since the start of the year, has been an impressive one, she says. “From Albion to Kingston is lovely and you can reach Kingston in no time,” she notes.

Mrs. Noyan, however, bemoans the traffic congestion she encountered in the Yallahs square area due to the ongoing road works and hopes that very soon, this section of the SCHIP will catch up with the others that are at an advanced stage of completion.

The SCHIP is being implemented by the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation, with co-funding from the Government of Jamaica and China EX-IM Bank.

The objective of the project is to improve the alignment and capacity of the existing southern coastal main arterial road to make it safe and efficient, free from flooding, and provide for future development.