THE north coast highway under construction along Jamaica’s north shore, linking Negril with Port Antonio, is now projected to cost almost $21 billion, more than double the payouts estimated in 2001 when construction of the highway was already underway for four years.

At the beginning of March, Sunday Finance had estimated that $19 billion had been allocated to build the roadway, 78 per cent more than the $10.6 billion that government had budgeted as the price tag for the total project.

But last week, the latest budget figures tabled in Parliament revealed that the revised cost on the project was $20.7 billion.

Data from the Estimates of Expenditure indicate that the government had spent $11.3 billion on the road construction up to March 2006, of which $7.7 billion represented taxpayers’ dollars.

Contracts for an additional $8.96 billion were signed last year, which would take the project to completion in June 2008, and which would make the total $20.3 billion.

It was unclear what the additional $400 million would be used for, although the report indicated that additional retention payments would be made to the contractor and householders for land acquisition for segment one of the highway – from Negril to Montego Bay – which was completed in 2001.

Transport minister Bobby Pickersgill did not return several calls for comment on the new figures. Pickersgill had also promised a response, weeks ago, to the story published in March, but never did.

The latest contract for work on the highway was awarded in December 2005 to E Pihl and Sons, a Danish firm, for US$50.3 million to construct 27.4 kilometres of road linking Montego Bay and Greenside in Trelawny – just over the border with St James.

Pihl had also won in August 2005 the $5.7 billion contract to build segment three of the highway, a 96 kilometre roadway from Ocho Rios to Port Antonio. Work is yet to begin on this segment, the final phase of the entire project.

The North Coast Highway Improvement Project was conceptualised in the early 1990s under the Michael Manley administration to spur hotel and tourism development in Jamaica.

Back then, it was believed that the entire project would take nine years, from 1991 to March 2000.

However, construction of the first segment of the highway, Negril to Montego Bay, did not begin until September 1997. Since then, there have been other delays, and financial overruns.

The first segment was completed in September 2002, almost three years behind schedule, and had a US$47 million overrun.

Segment two, which runs from Montego Bay to Ocho Rios, was initially to cost US$60 million, and scheduled to be completed in June 2004. But up to last year March, the project had a US$91.5 million price tag, representing an overrun of US$31.3 million.

Large sections of segment two are yet to be completed. For example, no discernible work has yet begun on the 27.4 kilometre Montego Bay to Greenside leg, where the new road would link with the recently completed Falmouth bypass.

The Caribbean Development Bank approved a US$54.1 million loan to Jamaica for this phase.

In St Ann, there are large sections that are yet to be built, for example, from St Ann’s Bay to Ocho Rios, and from east of Discovery Bay to the beginning of the Queens Highway.

The final phase, Ocho Rios to Port Antonio, is expected to take 32 months.

To finance the Ocho Rios to Port Antonio leg, the European Union is providing $3.8 billion, while the Jamaican government is expected to contribute just over $1.86 billion.

Overall, $11.7 billion, or 56.7 per cent of the total project cost, is expected to be financed by external sources, which also includes the Inter American Development Bank.

Jamaica is funding the remaining $9 billion.