It’s normal to associate road rage with angry confrontations involving two or more motorists.

However, on Jamaican roads, uncontrolled anger sometimes comes about not from any interaction with another person, but from badly scoured, pot-holed surfaces which can lead to vehicular crashes and/or depleted, even empty wallets.

Anyone whose vehicle has slammed into a hole — which possibly wasn’t even there last week — sometimes suffering a punctured tyre or worse, knows exactly what we are talking about.

We suspect that road surfaces are posing a major headache for the Government as it approaches local government elections, now expected within weeks.

It’s well-established in this country that winning elections becomes extra hard when main and community roads are as bad as many have been for years.

In our view, new highways by themselves, no matter how beautiful, won’t cut it.

It’s not that the authorities haven’t attempted road repairs. They have, to some extent, though not comprehensively enough.

A big challenge has been unseasonal downpours in much of the country during November, December, and even into January, washing out recently patched road surfaces.

A classic case is that crucial link between coastal Westmoreland and Montego Bay, which includes Sangster International Airport, through upland communities such as Ramble and Montpelier on the Westmoreland/Hanover/St James border.

That road is particularly important since it is a favoured corridor for the ferrying of visitors to and from the airport to growing community tourism havens on the south coast.

Yet, for too long sections have been so scoured, motorists have had to slow to a crawl, tediously negotiating holes resembling open trenches.

It’s common knowledge that inadequacy and sometimes the absence of drains are major contributory factors in rapid road deterioration.

Drain construction is obviously expensive and time-consuming. That, perhaps, explains an over-reliance on quick-fix patching.

In that respect, we note the planned $40-billion Shared Prosperity through Accelerated Improvement to our Road Network (SPARK) programme, first announced by the Government in last year’s budget presentation.

Prime Minister Andrew Holness says $10 billion is to be initially allocated for Jamaica’s 63 constituencies to carry out road improvement projects in the upcoming fiscal year.

A consultative process involving Members of Parliament and their constituents regarding roads most in need of repair will lead to each constituency being allocated $150 million.

Anxious to get going, Holness has given a timeline for the end of March to complete consultation and decision-making.

We note concerns by Opposition parliamentarians that, given upcoming elections and the budget debate, that timeline may be too short to ensure efficiency and thoroughness.

Whatever happens from here, we think it important that the road repairs be thorough and long-lasting. Inevitably, given Jamaica’s terrain, that will require a built-in drainage aspect for most of those projects, we believe.

It will be important for all involved in the consultative process — from highest to lowest — to ensure that t’s are crossed and i’s dotted.

Cynicism involving road repair programmes — with many people believing they are little more than feeding troughs for those with sticky fingers — is long-standing.

Every effort should be made to ensure that there is public trust in this SPARK initiative.