UWI principal Professor Clement Sankat has endorsed plans to introduce a rapid rail system in T&T, saying it will ease traffic problems.
"You cannot take economics out of anything, including the rapid rail. We built roads, over passes but the challenges remain. One of the biggest riderships is the UWI population which has grown to 18,000. Then there are 3,000 members of staff. You are looking at a captive ridership of about 21,000. This coupled with the inability to find parking spaces," he said.
Sankat, who was speaking yesterday at the opening of the Conference on the Economy (COTE) hosted by UWI's Department of Economics, said apart from comfort, a rapid rail system and the train stations that go along with it will generate additional business.
"You go to a rapid rail system or a subway station and it is like a shopping mall. Could you imagine the benefits for that here? I have always had a big vision for the development of our country to make it a truly world class, industrialised country. If you look at small countries like Singapore they have invested," he said.
He said even if the resources are not there for some types of large infrastructural works, a country's leadership must be resourceful and innovative to solve the problems.
"There are countries around us with less resources, challenging times and they are still building their infrastructure. Jamaica is building roads from Montego Bay to Ocho Rios. To use it you must pay a toll. This says that the days of complete freeness is over, if you want to build a country," Sankat said.