The Half-Way Tree Transport Centre, which is scheduled to be constructed over the next 30 months, is long overdue. The Ministry of Transport and Works has been advertising the planned centre
as the first transport centre of its kind in Jamaica which will
offer all the conveniences of a modern transit station. Similar
stations for road and rail transport, matching airport facilities,
are run-of-the-mill in much of the rest of the world. For the
construction of such a centre in Jamaica to be just getting
off the ground in the fifth year of the 21st century, if the proposed schedule is kept, says something about the regard of the Government for the comfort and convenience of the travelling
public using public transport.The land at the corner of Eastwood Park Road and North Odeon Avenue was acquired some time ago for the purpose and the old Odeon theatre demolished with fanfare. What has caused the long delay? Under a previous minister, the Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC) was formed as Government's response to the
disorderly and dysfunctional franchise system. The franchise system itself was a halfway response to the rough reign of the robot system after the collapse of the Jamaica Omnibus Service in the mid-1970s.
The Half-Way Tree Transport Centre is earmarked to become the principal bus terminus for the JUTC in the Corporate Area; that is, if the publicly owned and subsidised company survives. So far, the Government has been unable to deal with the operational
inefficiencies of the bus company, which has been packed with party faithfuls, and with the competing illegal route taxi system which many commuters prefer to use.
The creation of the JUTC, which greatly improved public
transport after more than two decades of pain, never came with the infrastructural improvement which the Half-Way Tree Transport Centre is promising for the comfort and convenience of commuters. Travellers have been left exposed to the elements, without sanitary conveniences, without seating, and without any reasonable security presence.
Half-Way Tree is probably the busiest town centre with the
greatest through flow of commuters in the country. Other centres in the capital city and in towns all across Jamaica have become
congested, chaotic, ugly and dangerous from the failure to regulate public transport and to confine operations to designated managed space. The Government was able to make a lucky purchase of land which became available in the heart of Half-Way Tree for the
transport centre. Other Corporate Area centres, and townships around Jamaica, are crying out for similar attention long overdue. The difficulty of acquiring suitable land space so late in the day could be a real problem even if the money for the investment can be found from the public purse.
Transit stations will not just improve the long neglected comfort and convenience of commuters and the regulation of the public transport system; they should be considered an important part of any strategy to improve attitudes and values and public order.
THE OPINIONS ON THIS PAGE, EXCEPT FOR THE ABOVE, DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF THE GLEANER.
