TANGLE RIVER, St James- One year after hurricane Ivan unleashed its fury on the island and caused a massive landslippage here, which rendering the roadway that links the community with several major thoroughfares impassable, the government is yet to reinstate the roadway or to construct an alternative road.

Several residents and commuters who usually use the roadway told the Observer earlier this week that the absence of the road to the community has greatly inconvenienced them.

“The absence of that piece of road has caused me to incur additional transportation costs because I now have to use a private property and pay a toll of $100 daily,” said salesman Wayne Hall, who sells juices between Montego Bay and Elderslie in St Elizabeth.

Shortly after the category four hurricane, some area residents constructed a makeshift road using stones and marl on a private property linking Montego Bay and their community and have applied a $100-charge for its use.

The residents who constructed the road at that time argued that the fee was geared at recovering the $50,000 expenditure.

But although the fees collected from the toll are said to have long surpassed the targeted amount, operators of the toll are still enforcing the $100-charge.

Farmers in the community said the fee has resulted in additional transportation cost and they, like the motorists and residents, are calling on the government to come to their rescue.

“The ‘toll’ really killing us and if we don’t use the ‘toll road’ we will have to travel and additional seven miles to bypass it,” one farmer said.

Member of Parliament Derrick Kellier told the Observer on Thursday that while he understood the plight of the motorists and residents, it would be imprudent to repair the damaged road without carrying out a comprehensive analysis of the area where the slippage occurred – one year later.

“It would be pointless to go ahead and repair the road without carrying out a proper analysis to determine what caused the massive landslippage,” Kellier said, arguing that to do otherwise could result in a waste of taxpayers’ money.

He said that over the past few months crews from the National Works Agency have been carrying out tests in the area to determine how best to deal with the situation. He noted, however, that a decision is yet to be made on how to deal with the situation.

Apart from damage to the roadway, the landslippage in Tangle River also resulted in the uprooting of several graves, extensively damaging a church as well as several houses. Crops were also badly affected.