Dear Editor,

The Government of Jamaica has announced plans to create a One Road Authority, a centralised mega agency that would absorb the National Works Agency (NWA) and the parochial road units within municipal corporations.

The promise is that a single body will bring uniform standards, greater efficiency, and easier management. But when you look beyond the headline, it becomes clear that this proposal does not solve the real problems behind Jamaica’s failing road network; in fact, in my opinion, it threatens to make them worse.

Jamaica’s road crisis has never been about confusion over who owns which road. The issue is far more straightforward and far more serious. Jamaica has a funding problem, not a structure problem. The agencies responsible for maintaining our roads simply do not have enough resources. Creating a new authority does not add a single dollar to the system. All it does is shift the same limited resources into a bigger bureaucracy, giving the appearance of reform without delivering the tools needed to actually fix the roads.

If the Government were proposing to properly fund road maintenance, increase allocations to municipal corporations, or reimplement the protected road maintenance fund, this would be a very different conversation. But none of that is on the table. Instead, what is being offered is an organisational reshuffle dressed up as transformation. You cannot fix a funding problem by rearranging the chairs in the room. You cannot undo decades of neglect by renaming departments. And you certainly cannot solve Jamaica’s road crisis by centralising it under one authority which will be overstretched.

Centralisation also creates new and serious problems. At present, communities can reach out to their municipal corporations and/or councillors when a road needs urgent attention. The system is not perfect, but it is local, responsive, and practical. Under a One Road Authority, the fear is that access would disappear. Every local deteriorating road, collapsed drain, or blocked gully would have to compete in a national queue managed from Kingston. Instead of speeding things up, this would slow everything down. Approvals would take longer, response times would increase, and local priorities would get lost in layers of centralised paperwork. Jamaica’s road network needs more responsiveness, not less.

The Government also claims that a single road authority will ensure consistent standards. But Jamaica already has national road standards. There are technical specifications for asphalt thickness, sub-base preparation, drainage design, and slope stabilisation. There are maintenance guidelines, so the problem is not a lack of standards. The problem is that they are not consistently enforced. Rather than removing local control, the Government could simply enforce the standards that already exist. A centralised authority does not guarantee enforcement, strong oversight does.

Even more concerning is the level of political control this model would concentrate. Instead of multiple agencies with separate budgets, engineers, and accountability systems, there would be one ministry, one budget, one politically appointed board, and one contractor selection pipeline. That kind of concentration increases the risk of political interference and favouritism. Communities would lose direct accountability through their local representatives, while Kingston would gain enormous power over which roads get fixed and which are left behind. This is not efficiency. It is centralised political power, and Jamaica has seen before how dangerous that can be.

The proposal also ignores a basic reality: Jamaica’s roads are not all the same, and they cannot be managed the same way. Farm roads need frequent small interventions, regular grading, drain clearing, and quick responses after rainfall. Community roads require timely patching, routine drain cleaning, and coordination with water and sewage systems. Highways and other main roads demand heavy engineering, long-term resurfacing plans, and complex construction methods. A one-size-fits-all authority simply will exacerbate the problems.

Around the world, many of the best road systems operate under decentralised models. In the United States, federal highways, state roads, and county roads are managed separately under shared engineering standards. In Canada, provinces oversee major roads while municipalities manage local networks, guided by national safety rules. The United Kingdom follows a similar approach, with national highways managed separately from local and rural roads. Even Barbados, a small island like Jamaica, divides responsibilities across ministries and departments instead of placing everything under one authority. These systems work because they enforce standards, fund maintenance properly, and preserve local responsiveness. They do not try to solve coordination challenges through unnecessary centralisation.

Jamaica should follow what has already been proven to work: decentralised management backed by strong national standards. Municipal corporations must be properly resourced, the NWA should focus on major roads with the technical capacity and budget to do so, and contractors must be properly supervised. Standards must be enforced, and communities must have direct access to those responsible for maintaining their infrastructure.

The Government is right about one thing: Jamaicans do not care who owns the road. What they care about is whether the road is functional, whether repairs are timely, and whether authorities respond when infrastructure fails. If the Government truly wants to solve Jamaica’s road crisis, it should invest in the system, strengthen oversight, and empower local agencies instead of trying to create another layer of bureaucracy.

For all these reasons I believe the proposed a One Road Authority must be firmly, confidently, and unequivocally rejected.

Kijana Johnson

Councillor

Race Course Division

People’s National Party