TRANSPORT and works minister Robert Pickersgill says the National Works Agency (NWA) has cleared approximately 50 per cent of the roads that were block following the passage of Hurricane Ivan last weekend. He said, however, that all the island’s main arterial roads were cleared.

According to Pickersgill, the NWA had up until Thursday received 642 reports of blocked roads. However, he said 332 have been cleared.

But the minister said as the days go by and more people have telephone access and NWA officers are able to go deeper into rural Jamaica, the number of reported blocked roads will increase.

“With the increases (in cleared roads) I am confident that our dedication and commitment to provide access for the free movement of people, goods and services will take on even greater levels of determination to return our thoroughfares to normality,” Pickersgill told a press briefing at the NWA’s offices on Maxfield Avenue in Kingston yesterday.

The NWA, he said, has been charged with clearing all blocked roads including those that are the responsibility of parish councils.

About 10,000 kilometres of roadway were blocked and deemed impassable after Hurricane Ivan downed and caused flooding and landslides across the island.

Yesterday, Pickersgill said the NWA will develop – through coordination between that agency, the Kingston and St Andrew Corporation and the parish councils – a priority system to ensure that critical services, vital to returning the country to normality, are made available in the shortest possible time.

He said the NWA was also developing a scheduled restoration for blocked parish council roads, starting next week.

“Particular requests for speedier clearance from whatever quarter must be based on the priority system developed by the NWA if we are not to derail the programme,” said the minister. “Such a request must be communicated to the emergency response centre and the regional manager, who has full responsibility for the deployment of the equipment,” the minister added.

The Emergency Response Centre is currently being operated out of the NWA’s main office in Kingston.

Roads still to be cleared include the Seaforth Town to Pisah; Bethel Town to Lambs River; Ashton through to Dundee and Bethel Town to York in Westmoreland.

In St Catherine, the Sligoville main road remains closed because of a breakaway that worsened during Ivan’s passage, while the Williamsfield to Glengoffe road is blocked at Mount Industry by large boulders and landslips.

In St Andrew, the Coopers Ridge to Hardware Gap road, which was already cleared, is again impassable as a result of another land slippage that occurred on Thursday between Irish Town and Hardware Gap.

Several roads in Clarendon are also blocked. These include Mocho to Frankfield; Sandy Rover to Macknie and Grantham to Trout Hall main roads which all have breakaways, allowing only small vehicles on the single lane entrance.

St James’ Point to Flamstead road is now impassable because of a breakaway at Tangle River that has cut the road in two, while the Flamstead to Mocho road remains impassable because of washed-out culverts that have left a cavern over four feet deep across the roadway.

Meanwhile, the Montpelier to Cambridge road is blocked at Bickersteth and Seven Rivers; Falmouth to Springvale was yesterday under flood water at Logwood Valley; and parts of the Ulster Spring to Stetting road have collapsed at Freeman’s Hall.

In St Elizabeth, the Thornton to Appleton main road remains blocked at the bridge at Appleton Estate.

“Vehicular traffic is not allowed (but) Appleton Estate’s CEO Robert Henriques has arranged a jetty to ferry people across until the water recedes,” Pickersgill noted.

Yesterday, the transport and works minister also assured users of the Portmore causeway bridge that Ivan’s passage had little effect on the bridge’s structure.