by Kevon Browne
St. Kitts and Nevis (WINN): No date has been confirmed with respect to when the seven new traffic lights will be operational. George Gilbert Senior Engineer at the Public Works Department spoke of the elements that have caused the delays.
“The traffic lighting should have been commissioned some time ago, but we are experiencing some delay with the traffic lighting. Some of the delays involved property owners, business owners requesting other [alternatives which weren’t] taken care of in the development. And as such, we’re actually reviewing it before we go forward with this. So that’s what’s causing some of the delays with us, actually totally on the lights. As soon as we get those [issues] regularized, we’ll be able to move swiftly into it… there was a case where one property owner is asking us to do something additional, which no provision was made for, and we actually have to go back to the drawing board and actually do our traffic count again to ensure that what they’re asking for can be done, or cannot be done… In [doing so], we had some of the final discussion just before the lockdown… We couldn’t do the [vehicle] count [during the] lockdown, it would [cause] skewed numbers… so we have to wait until the traffic really gets back to full gear… very soon we’re [going to] do the count, and then we will actually get the numbers and make our decision.”
Apart from the delays, Gilbert also mentioned that there will still be a period of reporting and consultations with property owners and the government before the lights become operational and traffic flow in Basseterre changes.
