Petrina Francis, Staff Reporter
Dr. Lucien Jones (left), vice-chairman of the Jamaica Road Safety Council, in discussion with Paula Fletcher, executive director of the council, during a full council meeting at the Courtleigh Hotel, New Kingston, yesterday. - RICARDO MAKYN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
SENIOR SUPERINTENDENT Ealan Powell, head of the Police Traffic Division, is urging the Island Traffic Authority (ITA) to pay closer attention to cars that are modified, in a bid to reduce the number of traffic fatalities.
"The ITA will have to pay a lot more attention to the modification that is done to vehicles, because you are finding that these vehicles have engines that are very, very fast, but the braking system is not modified in keeping with the engine," SSP Powell said yesterday following the National Road Safety Council meeting at the Courtleigh Hotel, New Kingston.
He added that the modification of vehicles "is a serious problem because most of the deaths on the road have been as a result of excessive speeding because the more you speed, the more difficult it is to manoeuvre the vehicle."
BE MORE CAUTIOUS
SSP Powell said that, while there were no restrictions on importing vehicles based on their engine capacity, motorists who drive these vehicles should be more cautious.
He also said there was a problem with overladen vehicles that were not made to carry the capacity that they are carrying, leading to the braking system not being able to stop vehicles with that capacity.
Meanwhile, Dr. Lucien Jones, vice-chairman and convenor of the National Road Safety Council, said he was disappointed that the Government has yet to privatise the ITA.
But Joan Wynter, senior policy director in the Ministry of Housing, Water, Transport and Works, said her ministry was moving to transform the department into an executive agency, but could not provide details on the privatisation process.
A study conducted by PAHO, and released recently, found that of the nearly 450 persons in its sample, as high as 71 per cent did not do the appropriate driver's test.
