LUCEA, Hanover — The majority of councillors in the Hanover Municipal Corporation (HMC) have rejected what they see as a revision of plans to use reinforced concrete to surface the heavily trafficked Seaview Drive in the parish capital.

The councillors were upset after they were told that the asphaltic concrete will be used instead to repair the road.

“Why can’t Hanover get the concrete [road] just like Fern Gully and Bog Walk Gorge? I don’t think we as Hanoverians are supposed to accept this because we’re going back to square one,” argued Councillor Marvell Sewell (People’s National Party, Green Island Division).

“Potholes are going to jump up again. Better they keep it and they spare the money [because] two weeks, three weeks after they finish, we are going back to square one. We want to move from this now.

If it’s going to be the same asphaltic concrete, it’s going to remain the same. They just throw anything upon us here in Hanover, and we’re tired of complaining,” added Sewell.

He argued that as the parish ranked third in tax payments islandwide, Hanover should be treated better. Sewell’s outburst came during Thursday’s sitting of the HMC’s monthly general meeting, after a confusing exchange of information. His sentiment was shared by six of seven councillors present at the time.

The discrepancy began when mayor of Lucea Sheridan Samuels, who was giving the corporation an update about the project, was interrupted by the municipal corporation’s Chief Engineering Officer Saad Campbell who told the corporation that, coming out of a meeting on Wednesday with the National Works Agency (NWA) and the parish traffic committee, “the $39-million [concrete] project we spoke about is basically going to be cancelled”.

Campbell said the work is now to be undertaken under the SPARK (Shared Prosperity through Accelerated Improvement to our Road Network) programme, which had been the initial plan.

“As it stands now, the road level is going to be raised at a rate of approximately eight to 10 inches in the same zone that they spoke about.

However, based on the allocation from the SPARK programme, they are going to do asphaltic concrete, which will then be supported by sea wall works and revetment works,” stated Campbell.

However, Member of Parliament (MP) for Hanover Western Heatha Miller Bennett, who was present at Thursday’s meeting, said she was unaware of the points raised by Campbell and she had sought clarification from the contractors doing the work.

“I just checked with CHEC [China Harbour Engineering Company] people about what you raised about the sea wall and I was told that it is roller-compacted concrete that will be used; that has not changed.

They are not aware of any changes with respect to that,” Miller Bennett informed the council meeting.

To her comment Campbell responded: “They have stopped the $39-million project, which is the reinforced concrete, and are now going back to the original SPARK approval, which is asphaltic concrete.

So when they make mention of ‘rolled concrete,’ it is really asphaltic concrete — what we call Barber-Greene — and not reinforced concrete as was previously agreed in that initial meeting.” At that point Samuels argued that there is a need for a stakeholders’ meeting with the NWA to iron out the matter.

Last Friday, the Jamaica Observer sought clarification from the NWA’s Community Relations Officer Janel Ricketts, who argued that the confusion stemmed from a misunderstanding of terminology.

In referencing a release from minister with responsibility for works Robert Morgan, Ricketts noted that temporary restoration work — to set the base and do asphalting of the surface — started last weekend and will continue until the main project commences to ease the current traffic snarls.

The overarching project, announced two weeks ago, includes the placement of an eight-inch-thick rigid (cement) concrete pavement that will form part of the resilience being built into the roadway.

It is part of the corridor from Montego Bay to Negril, which is to benefit under the main roads component of the multi-billion-dollar SPARK project, with some $4 billion allocated to this stretch.

Morgan argued that given the necessity to replace aged six-inch water pipelines and provide for the installation of underground utilities, executing the work through the SPARK project would ultimately provide greater benefits for Hanover and the country’s tourism product.

The minister also said the NWA had been tasked with immediately targeting other roads that will serve as alternatives to Seaview Drive.

These include the road from Riley to Dias to Glasgow and Green Island, the Long Hill main road, and the stretch from Montpelier in St James to McField in Westmoreland.

Morgan added that activities on Seaview Drive will remain low-key until work on the alternative routes has been substantially completed.

Under SPARK, repairs were recently completed on the Malcolm Heights alternative route in Lucea while remaining works on Old Road, Houghton Gardens, Moseley Drive, and East Avenue are slated to be carried out soon by the NWA.