A work crew from Bouygues construction company doing repair work on the roadway in the Bog Walk gorge. - Ian Allen/Staff Photographer

The Bog Walk gorge, which suffered massive scouring from flood waters during the passage of Tropical Storm Gustav, should be fully restored by the end of this month.

Bouygues Travaux Publics Jamaica Limited has offered to rebuild the road free of cost to the Jamaican Government and has committed to this deadline to complete the project.

According to Transport and Works Minister Mike Henry, the work on the gorge will be limited to restoring the roadway but where there are challenges outside of the scope of works, an arrangement has been agreed on. "Great problems will be discussed with me because they have offered a 50- per-cent discount on any major work that would have to be done that would not complement the work overall. So it's a work in progress and I can assure you that it's quite a few million dollars that is being spent here and we want to thank Bouygues for that."

Helpful offer

He added that it was an offer that was very helpful to the Government and the country. Meanwhile, Bouyges Chief Executive Officer Louis Brais noted that the greatest challenge faced in executing the project was doing so within the projected deadline.

"The reason why we made the call to Minister Henry is that Bouygues was in a unique position because of our equipment located on Highway 2000 to react very quickly and so with the relationship developed over the last seven years it was almost our responsibility of duty to come to the assistance of the Jamaican Government after Gustav," he explained.

He said that from what he had seen the roadway had been totally washed away in at least five areas and he was aware that with the volume of work being undertaken by the National Works Agency (NWA) their resources were stretched, hence the offer from the road-construction company.

Chief executive officer of the NWA, Milton Hodlin, also told JIS News that the NWA would be collaborating on the project in an oversight role, adding that other areas will be looked at, such as de-silting of certain key areas of the river, overhanging cliffs, and other issues outside of the scope of to be carried out by Bouygues.