Hartley Neita, ContributorDuring the 1950s, I had the pleasure of driving on the M1, a new highway connecting Birmingham with London. It was then Britain's proud showcase. Not only was the surface mirror-smooth, but the verges were beautifully landscaped. It was joy.
Over the years since, I have driven on highways in Canada, the United States, France, Germany, China and many other countries, and have been envious about the standard of those roads. And I have used the excuse to friends from those countries who visit Jamaica, that it is because of our difficult topography that our roads are so winding and narrow and sub-standard.
Forty years ago, it took me three hours and 20 minutes, driving hard, to travel from Kingston to Brown's Town in St. Ann. To get there meant travelling through the winding and rough streets of central Spanish Town, the narrow Rio Cobre gorge, through Bog Walk and Linstead where the road squeezed through houses on either side of the road, up the hill which twisted and turned to Ewarton, and then along the steep hill to the peak of the Mt. Diablo, and down to Moneague. Finally, there was the stone-and-marl road from Claremont through Bamboo to Brown's Town. (Incidentally, it is now deteriorating!)
The journey, 68 miles then, took all the daylight hours to get there and return to Kingston. Gradually, however, the roads were improved. There are now bypasses around Spanish Town, Bog Walk, Linstead and Moneague. The 16-mile-long Moneague to Bamboo road was widened and paved, mile by mile, and reduced the time of travel from over one hour to 25 minutes of easy driving. The Rio Cobre road was widened and repaved. So, too, was the southern slope of the Mt. Diablo road. And, of course, the bypass roads on the way were beautiful and made driving a pleasure.
To non-engineers like myself, it seemed that after all these improvements we would continue, ad infinitum, to suffer the agony of a narrow and winding and dangerous roadway on the northern slope of the Mt. Diablo.
Changes
Until last year when men and machines gouged the cliffs on this road. So now, there is one of the delightful driveways in Jamaica for motorists and passengers who see in the early mornings, just after sun-up, a thousand pin-pricks of sunlight flickering from the dew drops on the leaves of the trees and grass growing on either side of the road. All that's left now is for the edges to be landscaped with flowering shrubs.
Other road projects which I can now "show off" to my visiting friends include the highway linking Kingston with Morant Bay, the bypasses around May Pen, St. Ann's Bay, Ocho Rios, Four Paths and Mandeville, the new Junction road, the spectacular new Spur Tree Hill and Melrose Hill roads, and the new Old Harbour bypass.
This latter road cuts through country which was not seen in recent years as it was the former route of the railway. It is a beautiful area of Jamaica, still unspoilt, except for the indiscriminate logging of the lignum vitae trees which have been growing there since the times of the Tainos.
Hopefully, the agencies responsible will not allow uncontrolled vending to clutter the verges as has been permitted elsewhere. If only, for example, attractive wayside stops with kiosks could be developed with toilet facilities in lay-bys on these highways, instead of a string of tilting stalls displaying bottles of honey, or naseberries, or shrimp, as now exists at Cross near May Pen, Yallahs and Middle Quarters, respectively, or sub-standard jerk pits at Boston in east Portland, or the stands selling craft on the coast roads of St. Ann and Trelawny. With the smell of stale urine in the vicinities.
That sort of old-world charm and quaintness was the vintage tourism product of yesterday. That's gone. It was yesterday. So, let's get with it and log on to today and tomorrow.
