NWA to get $5.9 Billion to Improve Roads and Bridges

A sum of $5.9 billion is earmarked to facilitate the National Works Agency (NWA) to undertake a number of programmes, aimed at further improving the country’s road and bridge network during the current fiscal year.
Making his presentation in the 2008/09 Sectoral Debate in the House on May 28, Transport and Works Minister, Michael Henry said the work would incorporate road and infrastructure construction, repair and maintenance; flood control systems improvements, and traffic management improvements.
These efforts, he pointed out, would be augmented by the National Road Services Improvement Programme (NARSIP), which should strengthen the NWA’s institutional capacity, to enable the latter to deliver on its broad mandate.
The Minister explained that some $730 million, including $300 million from the Road Maintenance Fund, is earmarked to undertake maintenance work in five parishes – Westmoreland, Manchester, St. Catherine, St. Thomas and Portland. These activities are being spearheaded by the NARSIP. A sum of $2 billion has also been proposed to fund the NWA’s periodic maintenance activities during the current year.
Also continuing this year, Mr. Henry advised, is the NWA’s Northern Jamaica Development Programme, which is estimated to cost some $2.3 billion. The parish of St. Ann, with a slew of new hi-tech traffic signals, among other facilities, is already beginning to reap the major benefits of this programme.
In the area of bridge construction, rehabilitation, and maintenance,
Mr. Henry said the NWA is to spend some $1.6 billion on three programmes this year.
Some of the major road and infrastructural projects to be undertaken by the NWA this year include: the Spanish Town Road Improvement Project; Washington Boulevard Phase II expansion; further protection of the Palisadoes peninsula; preparation of a draft master drainage plan for the Corporate Area; protection of sections of the roadway in the Bog Walk Gorge; protective and earth works along the Yallahs to Easington roadway in St. Thomas; work under the Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development in St. Mary, St. Ann and Westmoreland; multiple rural rehabilitation under the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries/Government of Jamaica (OPEC/GoJ) project; and dualisation of the Bogue road in Montego Bay.