A crashed highway patrol car which was seen outside the Ferry police station in St. Catherine, yesterday. - Norman Grindley/Deputy Chief Photographer

EALAN POWELL, Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) in charge of traffic, has issued a call for resources to patrol Highway 2000 roadways.

Speaking at a Gleaner Editors' Forum last week, SSP Powell said the police were severely handicapped in patrolling the highways as they have only one car remaining out of the fabulous four commissioned in September 2002.

'Written off'

Of the four cars provided for the police to patrol the highways, two have been involved in accidents and have been 'written off' while another is in the garage.

"Those cars were being main-tained by NROCC (National Road Constructing Company) and they have now said they are unable to maintain the cars," SSP Powell said.

He added that the cars are very expensive to maintain and "the police force is finding it extremely difficult to maintain them and that is why they are not as visible on the road as they used to be".

"The Ministry (National Security), NROCC or the operators of the toll road (TransJamaica) must supply us with the tools to do the work. We are willing to do the work, we have the manpower, but we don't have the vehicles," the traffice police officer said.

Numerous accidents, although mainly minor in nature, have taken place on the Kingston to Sandy Bay and the Portmore legs of highway 2000. A TransJamaica emergency response personnel told The Gleaner yesterday that about 20 accidents have taken place on the Portmore leg of the highway, which has been opened since July.

No speed trap

The response personnel said that many of the accidents could have been prevented if persons were not speeding or improperly switching from lane to lane.

He said more police are needed on the highway as a deterrent to speeding, adding that he has never seen a police speed trap on the Portmore leg.

However, SSP Powell has said setting up speed traps on the Portmore leg would be dangerous and he is not prepared to expose his police to more danger.