Handcart maker Iyungo rents his four carts at $200 a day each. -Carlington WilmotGhetto ambulance, poor man's
transport, traffic nuisance -- they
all describe the handcart trade
in downtown Kingston
THEY CALL them ghetto ambulances.
Other people dismiss them as four-wheeled nuisances. But say what you want about the handcart, it is king of transportation in downtown Kingston. No other mode of haulage and carriage can function as effectively in the vehicle-choked lanes and alleys of the metropolis. The handcart is a cinch at manoeuvring through narrow lanes, transporting heavy items and dodging throngs of people going about their business.
It is a dangerous job, given the short fuse and intolerance of the downtown community and more than one cart operator has found himself moonlighting as an ambulance driver or fleeing for his life after a fracas in the heart of the city.
Dennis 'Pirate' McMorris, a resident of Spanish Town Road near the downtown area, remembers being shot in the knee as he tried to take a friend to the hospital on a handcart. His friend eventually died because McMorris was forced to abandon him and flee for his own life. His friend, 'Jimbo', left unattended for two days, died on the cart.
Lloyd Smith, another cart operator, related an incident where he had to carry a man to the hospital on his handcart. "Mi a push mi cart a carry some goods and mi si him inna a corner a bawl seh him waan go hospital, like him get cut so mi put him pon the cart an carry him to the hospital," said Smith.
Errol Brown has also had to transform his handcart into a ghetto ambulance on numerous occasions during his 15 years of hustling downtown. Trying to reach Kingston Public Hospital on a handcart through traffic can be hazardous, he says, especially when the street is a
one-way.
HANDCARTS, HANDCARTS EVERYWHERE
You cannot travel through downtown Kingston without seeing handcarts
bobbing and weaving among the sea
of people in the congested streets.
They are as much a part of the background scenery as the higglers and wholesale stores.
Handcart builder Iyungo of Matthews Lane, downtown Kingston, puts the cart population at between 3,000 and 4,000 -- and growing. Iyungo who started out with one cart, owned up to nine at one time -- eight of them built by him. Presently he has four and rents them for $200 per day each.
It provides a subsistence living at best but while cart operators complain, they survive, some managing to raise whole families on a threadbare income.
Father of eight, Errol Brown has been doing just that for the past 15 years. "Mi have eight youth still and dem deh a just weh deh a yard. Mi have youth out a road still and ah it send de whole a dem a school," said Mr. Brown. All their basic needs, like lunch money, uniform and school fees, and other necessities come from the cart, he added.
Still it's always a desperate race to get customers.
Lloyd Smith sat patiently outside a wholesale waiting for a hire. It took him awhile to remember how long he has been pushing his cart. After a few minutes he decided that it was during the era of the 1980s. He grumbled about the poor state of business but added: "Funds small still but it help."
COTTAGE INDUSTRY
The handcart business has also sparked a cottage industry of sorts with backward and forward linkages. People like Iyungo build them, rent them and operate them, making money on all fronts.
Rentals go for $200 per day, $400 on holidays and a cart builder can make up to $5,000 per sale. Keep in mind though that "you have to pay welder, buy steel for the wheel axle, bolts and nuts and wheels," said Iyungo. "The wheels are the most expensive."
The more expensive the wheel, the more money the cart fetches. A handcart uses two types of wheel. The bake on and the rub-a-dub. A bake on wheel cart can be sold for $5,000. The rub-a-dub wheel handcart can be sold for $3,000 to $3,500. Plus, explained Iyungo, "you have to service your handcart like you would service your car."
Handcart operators have even extended their hand to the fast lane of making money. They hold handcart races, zooming down from Red Gal Ring, Stony Hill, to Water Commission, downtown. "It dangerous sometime. A wheel can fly off an a man lose him life," said one daredevil racer.
NO RESPECT
The handcart business got a major public relations boost a few years ago with the release of the movie 'Cool Runnings'. The Jamaican bobsled team featured in the movie practised using hand-made handcarts on narrow roads before graduating to the icy slopes of international bobsled competition.
The glamour was only a flash in the pan though. While the commercial capital of Jamaica has relied on handcart service for several decades and despite easing the burdens of higglers and weary shoppers cart operators are spurned by some. Others find them a nuisance because they routinely flout traffic laws.
Sergeant Ruth Anderson of the Kingston Central Police Station has this to say about the handcart culture: "That is how they make their living, carrying people to and fro. However, they create havoc to vehicles and pedestrians.
"If they hit you they say is alright because they are also motorists," Sergeant Anderson said laughing.
"Why we tolerate them is because people need them and they are accessible and economical," she added, noting that while handcarts can move through the downtown area, taxi operators cannot.
ON THE OTHER HAND
Orville Brown, warehouse supervisor of Bashco Trading Company, at the corner of Beckford and Princess Streets, toasted handcart operators. The commercial centre is unimaginable without them, he said. "Downtown without them would be a problem. Sometimes they cause a problem but they make it easy for customers to carry their goods. Sometimes people buy table sets and it is heavy and they call a handcart man. I find them a good set of people to deal with at times but sometimes is like they wake up on the wrong side and cause confusion."
Community police officer Ruth Anderson was also sympathetic to handcart operators. "I have asked myself how can we facilitate them and they in turn facilitate us," said Ms. Anderson.
"It is the way of life of the downtown culture. Probably we can meet with them and work out a solution because we do not want to just throw them out. So we need to meet with them to come to a
satisfactory resolution that everyone
can be satisfied at the end of the
day," she added.
