WITH travel time cut to less than an hour for people using the North/South link of Highway 2000, a number of the island’s major manufacturing companies, which are expected to be impacted, have weighed in on the use of the infrastructure.

The road, which runs from the Caymanas intersection in St Catherine to Mammee Bay in St Ann, is one of the largest developments in the nation for several decades. It allows motorists to bypass both the Bog Walk Gorge and Mount Rosser, which have been a struggle for trucks carrying heavy loads, sometimes causing a large pile-up of traffic.

Chairman of Wisynco Group Limited and president of the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica William Mahfood told the Jamaica Observer that he is lobbying for a review of the proposed rates.

“The truth is, for distribution, at the current and proposed rates for the tolls, it would make it close to impossible for commercial traffic. I actually met with the minister and some of the technical people from the road authority and the ministry and we’re going to suggest a proposal that they look at special commercial rates for vehicles outside of normal traffic hours as a way to improve utilisation of the road as well as a lower cost for transportation,” he said.

Wisynco Group is the country’s largest distributing company, manufacturing and distributing world brand beverages such as Budwiser, Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Sprite, Ocean Spray Cranberry Juice and Red Bull along with its own brands, energy drink Boom, Wata, Cran Wata, and Bigga soft drinks.

Last month, the Government announced that motorists using the highway would benefit from a 25 per cent discount on the proposed rates for a one month period.

The Government entered into dicussions with the toll authority after public anger over the proposed rates which could have forced motorists to pay as high as $7,400 for a round trip between Caymanas in St Catherine and Mammee Bay in St Ann.

Meanwhile, head of corporate relations at Red Stripe Dianne Ashton-Smith said the new highway will save the company “substantial time” in terms of its distribution process.

“Currently, we use the highway from Linstead to St Ann. This saves us substantial time bypassing Mount Rosser and Chalky Hill. The additional time saved allows for us to complete two deliveries to our Discovery Bay distribution centre and cuts driver ‘windscreen time’ by an average of two hours (round trip),” she explained.

“We’ve found that the incremental cost versus the time saved by travelling from Mandela to Linstead outweighs the benefits,” Ashton-Smith added.

At the same time, chairman of Facey Commodity Company Limited Paul B Scott described the highway as a key component for manufacturing companies.

Scott said as such, the highway will allow the country to “work in a much more productive manner”.

“Without doubt, if all the strengths of Jamaica, such as tourism on the North Coast and human capital in Kingston, are closer, then we will see synergies over time that will reflect in our economic progress. With regard to our business, our interests are aligned to Jamaica’s. If Jamaica grows, then we will as well,” he said.