IT used to be the place to go for jerk and ‘pan’ chicken cooked on open flames in drums, night-time entertainment, and shopping. Red Hills Road hummed, literally, back then.

But in the past three years, it has become a shadow of its former self, milked of its vibrancy by extortionists and feuding politically-aligned gangs.

Today, there are two Red Hills Roads: the upper stretch that intersects with Eastwood Park Road, where several businesses continue to thrive; and the other end where Whitehall Avenue, 100 Lane, Park Lane, and such communities have become synonmous with trouble and flare-ups of violence.

In the daytime, traders and the schools along the stretch ensure a steady stream of traffic and people, keeping the area vibrant, but at night, most of the life disappears, and Red Hills Road becomes a thoroughfare to somewhere else.

But, before Knutsford Boulevard in New Kingston took over as the city’s hip strip, night-time entertainment meant a visit to Red Hills Road, its clubs and bars.

With a choice of more than six nightclubs, jerk vendors and street dances, it was the place to be.

“You could walk about from club to club, and even see live bands,” reminisces Monty Blake, operator of the former Turntable Club on Red Hills Road.

Running from Eastwood Park Road to Meadowbrook Avenue in St Andrew, Red Hills Road has developed a disturbing reputation.

The road traversing once peaceful uptown communities has become one of the city’s feared flashpoints of violence with stories of extortion, turf wars and political infighting.

The decline at Red Hills Road reached its lowest level in early 2002 when a violent flare up resulted in the killing of seven people and the burning of a housing block at 100 Lane.

In retaliation, four residents from Park Lane were killed by gunmen allegedly from 100 Lane. That sealed the fate of Red Hills Road and the stigma remains.

But a decade ago, things were markedly different. Any night of the week, its entertainment spots flourished with a choice of ribald amusement, subdued fraternising or nightclubbing somewhere on the road.

The once popular Front Line Monday-night dance, for example, had its birth on Red Hills Road at the intersection with Park Lane.

“There was something there for everyone,” says Blake, one of the three bothers who operated the landmark Turntable Club.

“There were the bars, dancing in the clubs, even the risqué ones were there, and live music. Sly and Robbie used to play at Tit for Tat,” he recalls.

Leading up to the transformation, venues such as Tit For Tat, Turntable, El Rancho, Top Hat or Stable, catered to varied tastes.

Of the lot, Turntable, which opened in 1973, stayed open the longest. But finally in desperation, the Blake bothers too finally packed up in 2002 and moved out.

“The violence was either gang-related or politically motivated but they never really troubled us,” says Blake.

“However, when you (patrons) hear that something like that is happening on Red Hills Road, you are not going there.”

The hot spot along Red Hills Road stretches from Black Ants Lane to the north to 100 Lane to the south. Factions from Park Lane – a Jamaica Labour Party enclave – have been at odds, intermittently, with the People’s National Party-affiliated 100 Lane gang.

Prior to moving out, Blake says the club had started losing business and had to scale down, opening at the latter stage only to its very dedicated patrons.

More recently, in August, Park Lane residents blocked Red Hills Road in protest over the shooting death of one of their own. The 100 Lane gunmen were blamed for the killing.

Earlier in the month, a 100 Lane youth was gunned down and a four year old child injured.

Red Hills’ nightlife is now reduced to the odd bars and a cluster of jerk chicken vendors in front of PriceSmart or across from the Emmanuel Gospel Assembly.

For business owners who have witnessed the change on the road, it is a disturbing experience, but some have chosen to stay.

Lee’s Food Fair, the very first supermarket on Red Hills Road, started in the early 1960s, says founder Icyline Lee.

Before massive renovation in the late 1990s, the popular Yan Yan restaurant, owned by the Lee family, stood upstairs the original Lee’s Food Fair.

As expected, things have changed a lot since those years, but it is not change, but crime that has Lee worried.

“It’s frightening,” she tells the Sunday Observer. “Up to this morning they killed a man next door,” Lee said, referring to a murder at the Texaco service station across the road.

The Lee family also owns Xxtra supermarket in the once thriving Red Hills Mall, another landmark on the road.

While criminal activity does drive away customers, Lee says that her businesses are not affected by extortionists, not now.

“They were bothering us, but it has died down. We got a letter once,” she says.

At Sunrise supermarket, another long time fixture of Red Hills Road, proprietor Jean Wong says she is both bothered by the uncertainties of crime and the slow down in the economy.

“We have had some very good times here,” she says, but quickly adds, “we have also had it rough sometimes..”

Rough times include occasional demonstrations on Red Hills Road, which have drastically affected business at the supermarket.

“We are right in the middle of it,” says Wong, referring to the volatile communities.

During the violent demonstrations in August, the supermarket remained closed while Lee’s Food Fair down the road was open for business.

“Customers have developed concerns about visiting the supermarket.”

For the uninitiated Red Hills Road has two distinct sections of activity. South of the overhead bridge at Dunrobin Avenue has always been predominantly commercial with little in the way of entertainment.

Above Lee’s Food Fair, just metres away, is where the night spots once flourished.

For now, the hot bed of violence, which has tainted the entire strip, is concentrated in the stretch between Whitehall Avenue and Black Ants Lane.

Across from Sunrise Supermarket, KFC has been hit by robberies and that section of the road close to Black Ants Lane is ominously dark at nights, the result of broken streetlights.

PriceSmart has not responded to requests for comment, but the American owned company, when it started construction on its warehouse supermarket at the end of the strip three years ago, had made deliberate attempts to develop a relationship with the surrounding communities as part of its security strategy.

Unlike other businesses in its vicinity, its sprawling store is fenced and its gates manned by security guards who control movement.

The more open Red Hills Mall, first developed by the now defunct Mutual Life Assurance company in the late 1970s, was an avant garde concept in its time.

The indoor mall, with ample shopping space, proved a hit initially then became a magnet for vagrants and alleged extortionists. Jencare Skin Farm, founded in 1989 by Jennifer Samuda, who counts Prime Minister PJ Patterson among her clientele, moved out of the mall in 2003 for more conducive accommodation on Hope Road.

But even while notable citizens such as Bank of Nova Scotia, Turntable Club and Jencare have exited the community, the entry of international retailer PriceSmart has kept hope alive in the community that at some point Red Hills Road may yet live again.

fosterp@jamaicaobserver.com