'Boulevard' project delayed again
Lynford Simpson, Staff Reporter
THE PROBLEM-PLAGUED Washington Boulevard project, already six months behind schedule, seems destined to miss its revised October 31 deadline. Outgoing Transport and Works Minister Dr. Peter Phillips will tour the site on Monday. But, pipes are still being laid and much of the road surface between Duhaney Park and the intersection at Molynes Road is still to be paved. There is no indication that landscaping work has begun and traffic signals and other road signs will still have to be installed and the road surface marked. Commuters and residents alike have grown increasingly impatient with the delays. "I would be happy if they just hurry up and get off the 'Boule-vard'", said a resident of the nearby Cooreville Gar-dens community. "It's becoming quite a nuisance," he added. Pamela Watson of the adjoining Washington Gar-dens community and who works downtown, King-ston, has not driven along the Boulevard for the past six months. "I literally gave up on them finishing that project on time," she told The Gleaner. Yesterday Vando Palmer, public relations manager at the National Works Agency (NWA), which has overall responsibility for the project, refused to comment on whether the work would be completed on time. He would only say the Minister would be touring the work site on Monday and that the contractors still had until Wednesday to "open up the road to vehicular traffic". Several messages were left for Michael Archer, project manager for Surrey Paving and Aggregates, the company that was awarded the contract for the multimillion dollar project. The calls were not returned up to press time. Warring factions from the nearby communities have forced a shutdown of the work site on more than one occasion, contributing to the delays and forcing the police to maintain a strong presence in the area. Last month the company was ordered by the NWA to take immediate remedial action to fix sections of the road it had completed, but which the agency deemed unsatisfactory. The site had been visited by Ivan Anderson, Chief Executive Officer of the NWA, who had expressed dissatisfaction with much of the work. Although The Gleaner reports were disputed by the company, workmen were caught on camera the following day knocking down sections of a wall that was poorly built and which the NWA had instructed should be rebuilt. The NWA warned at the time that no further delays would be accepted. Mr. Archer, while responding to Gleaner reports then, disclosed that the change in the scope of the work had pushed the cost of the project up by $76 million to $340 million, with the possibility for further escalation. He assured then that the work would be "substantially completed" at the end of October but said the contract would not end at that time. "To date we are still getting variations in this job," he said. According to Mr. Archer, the original contract was changed to include the re-configuration of the intersection at Duhaney Park and Cooreville Gardens, the extension of the median down to Six Miles and the addition of a slip road from Molynes Road along the southern carriageway. He insisted these were not part of the original contract. He said he was also affected by a lack of skilled personnel. Under phase one of the original contract, a section of the Mandela Highway between Ferry and Six Miles was re-surfaced. Phase two will result in the widening of the roadway between Duhaney Park and Molynes Road to accommodate six lanes and a new 30-metre bridge installed over the Constant Spring Gully in the vicinity of the Church of the Open Bible.
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