Lucea: A historic town in crisis

Once known for its thriving agriculture and export markets, Hanover’s capital of Lucea has been reduced to a town plagued with many ills. Sitting as a major hub between the tourism hotspots Montego Bay and Negril, the seaside town is grappling with deteriorating road conditions, water shortage, and a lack of proper amenities, among other challenges.

The state of the town has been a source of contention for many years, and according to Shermaine Anderson-Gayle, president of the Hanover Chamber of Commerce, “Lucea is bursting at its seams.”

Anderson-Gayle said the state of affairs has been affecting productivity and the earning power of the wider parish – the smallest of 14 in the island – which is wrapping up its year-long celebration of its 300th anniversary.

“It is just not working at all. When it rains, the place gets flooded. [Businesses] have to close early or people can’t pass through the town, so it delays a lot of processes. It also stops a lot of businesses from happening because people are not able to shop or go about their daily lives.

“I think Lucea is bursting at its seams. The municipal corporation, some of the banks, and the tax office have outgrown the spaces they are in,” the chamber president told The Sunday Gleaner recently.

In the eyes of many outsiders, Lucea is reduced to just a drive-through town, but for Hanoverians, it serves as the closest location to conduct business and engage in other activities. The cramped town centre is home to a bus park, a bustling market, banks, supermarkets, and other businesses. However, Anderson-Gayle pointed out that the congested town is not ideal for foot traffic.

“There is no parking, and you cannot walk because the roads are so [congested],” she lamented.

RIDDLED WITH POTHOLES

But even getting to the town centre is a major challenge as motorists have to dodge large craters along the main corridor leading into the capital. This hindrance has been the source of morning traffic jams, which often stretch to the nearby Johnson Town. Residents complain that what would normally be a quick drive lasting less than 10 minutes now takes up to an hour and a half because of the road conditions and the slow-moving traffic.

Several attempts by The Sunday Gleaner to discuss the affairs of the Hanover capital with Mayor Sheridan Samuels were unsuccessful.

Our news team was able to speak with Lucea Deputy Mayor Andria Dehaney-Grant, who agreed that the town’s road infrastructure is in dire need of a complete overhaul.

Although the National Works Agency (NWA) has done patching work on that thoroughfare, Dehaney-Grant told The Sunday Gleaner that much more is needed to fix the issues affecting the low-lying main road.

“I know that from time to time the NWA has patched some areas, but I believe it is time for us to do total rehabilitative work, especially from Great River to Negril. Every day we have hundreds of tourists pass through Lucea going to Negril, and we talk all the time about how much money we earn from the tourism dollars, but I think we need to spend some of it on the infrastructure, [mainly] the roadways,” Dehaney-Grant said.

Furthermore, she expressed discontent with the daily long lines of traffic leading into the town centre.

“As a parish, we won’t get better if we can’t use the time spent in traffic to do something productive. We can’t have a productive society if we waste so much time in traffic. I believe that the people in this parish are really suffering at this time. I am suffering, too. I go to work late sometimes. I am the principal of a school, and I have to pass through the traffic every day. It is very depressing,” she said.

MAJOR bottlenecks

Prime Minister Andrew Holness acknowledged the situation in his Budget Debate presentation earlier this year.

“The old coastal towns of Lucea and Hopewell in Hanover did not benefit from modern urban planning best practices,” he told the House on March 21. “In fact, they both date back hundreds of years to a time when horse and buggy were the common mode of transportation. The roads through the towns are now major bottlenecks.”

Holness said the Government would be constructing a Lucea/Hopewell bypass, which would be a four-lane highway starting along the Long Hill bypass that is currently being constructed.

“The alignment will then traverse westward for approximately 30 kilometres, with link roads to the main road before and after the town of Hopewell before terminating on the westward side of the town of Lucea,” he said.

The town also contends with inadequate parking spaces, poor infrastructure to accommodate pedestrians and lacks a central sewage system.

The 2018 Hanover Development Orders notes: “The majority of the business establishments in Lucea have been constructed without adequate provision of on-site parking. Although there is a municipal park in the town, this is inadequate based on the volume of vehicles accessing the town on a daily basis. This has resulted in undue obstruction from parking along the roadway.”

It noted further that the pedestrian environment in the town was “often unsatisfactory”.

“There are minimal sidewalks ... . Where they are provided, surfaces are often uneven and poorly maintained,” the document says.

Lucea also has to contend with the issue of flooding, should there be any rainfall in the parish. While the blame is often placed on the nearby Riley River, Dehaney-Grant is insisting that the town’s drainage systems are inadequate.

“That boils back down to the drain infrastructure on the roadway. We know that the Riley River sometimes floods because of bamboo, but now we are realising that even when the bamboo doesn’t cause the river to flood, there is a section of the roadway that’s being flooded, too. The drain infrastructure there is no longer able to take the amount of water that is being washed down,” she said.

However, while floodwaters drench the roadways, Dehaney-Grant told The Sunday Gleaner that Lucea is also plagued with a consistent water shortage. Referencing a recent fire at the town’s market, she pointed out that residents are often left with the short end of the stick.

“After the fire truck depleted its water trying to put out the fire, there wasn’t water in the town at that moment, and they had to go to Green Island for water and ask for a truck from Montego Bay to come, but by then, the damage was done. We have the Great River Water Treatment Plant and the Logwood Water Treatment Plant; that’s two water sources in the parish, and our people are suffering. Many communities don’t even have potable water,” she stressed.

“It always takes a longer time for us to get any resources in this parish. We deserve much better in terms of resources. As councillors, we are not able to do a lot because we don’t get the resources, and the municipal corporation is not able to raise enough funds from [our] revenue areas. We would appreciate it if we could get a little bit more attention to some of the things we need to be remedied in our parish,” Dehaney-Grant appealed.

NWA communications manager for the western region, Janel Ricketts, acknowledged that the town is “susceptible to flooding”.

“The major contributing factor to the flooding in Lucea is the low-lying nature of the town, sections of which are below sea level. This, coupled with increased development, which contributes to increased runoff, also creates a challenge,” Ricketts told The Sunday Gleaner.

“This, over time, affects the road infrastructure. To treat with this, the agency undertakes patching and local rehabilitation projects along the corridor. There is an upcoming patching programme [that] will seek to address the worst affected sections of this corridor and other roadways across the parish,” Ricketts added.

In January, Holness said that the Government may have to, at some point, build a new town, as Lucea could no longer accommodate the businesses as well as the people who traverse the town daily. He said that at some point in time, the chaos would cause the town to decay and collapse on itself.

“ ... This entire town of Lucea is at or just below sea level. When it comes to high tide or heavy rains, the town is flooded. So, any infrastructure we put here, we must make it climate resilient,” he said. “So, we might have to find lands adjacent to the town and put in new roads, put up new buildings and invite the people who are in the existing town to relocate there, while we take the lands here and redevelop them because this town has historic value.”

During his Budget presentation in March, the prime minister said, “It has become necessary to address the bustling overgrown state of the town of Lucea.”

He added that the Urban Development Corporation had been tasked to utilise its expertise to focus on building away from the waterfront, while maintaining existing buildings as heritage sites for tourism and various other economic activities.

He said the approach would be similar to that taken in the development of the Morant Bay Urban Centre in St Thomas.

A public park is also envisioned for the historic town.

rochelle.clayton@gleanerjm.com

Interesting facts

• The actual date of the establishment of the Hanover Parish Church is inconclusive, but records of the earliest recorded baptism was 1725. The dates of the earliest recorded marriage and death were 1727 and 1749, respectively. There are claims that the parish church has a tunnel to Fort Charlotte.

• Fort Charlotte, which was built to defend the harbour from French raiders, is the namesake of the George III’s Queen.

• The Lucea Police Barracks was once the Hanover District Prison from the 18th century. It is now home to the Hanover Museum.

• Piracy was one of the hallmarks of the early history of Hanover. Pirates would operate from the nearby coast specifically Negril Bay which was once an embarkation point for pirates. In fact, Henry Morgan who later became governor of Jamaica was said to be the owner of 4,000 acres of land in Riley, outside of Lucea.

• The Lucea historic clock, which was installed in 1817, was initially intended for St Lucia. However when it ended up in Jamaica, the locals claimed it and funded outstanding amounts through a subscription service. The clock, which is adorned by a German Helmet, sits atop the old Lucea courthouse.

• During colonial times, Lucea was a vibrant trade port as it was quite common for sales of slaves to take place at the port.

• Typical of the post-Emancipation period, the economy of Hanover became diversified and less dependent on sugar. The new peasantry engaged in the production of crops such as yam, cocoa, plantain and cassava. A particular variety of yam known as the Lucea yam later became affiliated with Hanover.

• Hanover saw items that were exported from the harbour up to the 1960’s. In the 1970’s there was the exploration of crafts. In the 1980s there was a sojourn into agro- processing with tumeric processing. Additionally, in 1962 a cocoa fermentary was established. A deepwater pier was constructed, but exportation from that particular port ceased in 1983 when the port was closed.

– Source: National Library of Jamaica