Santa Cruz , St Elizabeth — From as far back as most people can remember, Main Street trough, the centre of this south-central town, has been marked by chaos and disorder in the days prior to Christmas as a direct result of vendors taking over the sidewalks and even the street.

But there will be no more of that says Mayor of Black River and Chairman of the St Elizabeth Municipal Corporation Derrick Sangster.

He told the Jamaica Observer Central on Friday that the municipal corporation and the St Elizabeth police have agreed that vending will not be allowed on Main Street this Christmas.

Sangster said vendors will be asked to operate within the market as well as in special spaces to be arranged on Market Street, and in the transport centre at the western side of Santa Cruz (opposite ScotiaBank).

“We have decided there will be no vending on Main Street, we must have some order,” said Sangster.

“The police are fully on board,” he added.

Law and order apart, Sangster said there was need for equity in the way vendors are treated. In previous years, he pointed out, vendors in the market who pay required fees were deprived of business because others “who pay no fees” operate on the streets.

“That is not fair,” Sangster said.

Similar no vending rules will also be implemented at the centre of St Elizabeth’s two other major towns, Black River and Junction.

As usual at Christmastime, a temporary one-way system utilising Main Street and Institution Drive (often referred to as Bypass Road or Back Street) is to be implemented in Santa Cruz this week to ease traffic congestion. Sangster said the National Works Agency (NWA) had planned patching repairs on the badly potholed Institution Drive prior to implementation of the one-way system.

— Garfield Myers