The sound of squeak­ing shock ab­sorbers, un­der­car­riages scrap­ing against as­phalt, and blar­ing horns have be­come all too fa­mil­iar along Pa­pourie Road, Lengua, as mo­torists nav­i­gate a pre­car­i­ous land­slip that has con­sumed al­most half the road­way.

Lo­cat­ed near Ra­jack Ali Av­enue, the land­slip—stretch­ing ap­prox­i­mate­ly 300 feet long and plung­ing 20 feet deep—has al­ready claimed homes and threat­ens more. De­spite grow­ing con­cerns, res­i­dents say their pleas for in­ter­ven­tion have been ig­nored.

“No­body re­al­ly cares about us up here, you know,” a frus­trat­ed res­i­dent shout­ed, rais­ing a plac­ard in protest.

Cheryl Ra­jack, 56, who lives di­rect­ly op­po­site the land­slip, is des­per­ate for ur­gent re­pairs. Not on­ly do mo­torists now dri­ve through her yard to by­pass the erod­ing road, but her home it­self is at risk. Two months ago, her front step be­gan sep­a­rat­ing from the bal­cony, with cracks form­ing along the rails.

She and her hus­band, Shammed, 58, have lived there for decades, but fear they may soon be forced to leave, just like their neigh­bours whose house col­lapsed at the bot­tom of the land­slip.

“When trucks or big ve­hi­cles pass, the whole house vi­brates. I feel sor­ry for the ve­hi­cles drag­ging on the road—it is re­al­ly bad. Some­times, we wake up at night just to check if any­thing worse has hap­pened. Thank God no ve­hi­cles have run off the road yet,” Ra­jack said.

She fears the Min­istry of Works and Trans­port (MOWT) will wait un­til the rainy sea­son be­fore tak­ing ac­tion—by which time, she warns, the sit­u­a­tion will be cat­a­stroph­ic.

De­o­raj Ram­lo­gan, Sec­re­tary of the St Croix Taxi Dri­vers As­so­ci­a­tion, de­scribed the con­di­tions as a dai­ly night­mare for those com­mut­ing be­tween Princes Town and Bar­rack­pore.

With on­ly makeshift bam­boo rail­ings and cau­tion tape act­ing as safe­ty bar­ri­ers, he said nei­ther mo­torists nor pedes­tri­ans are tru­ly pro­tect­ed. The land­slip has al­so caused fre­quent con­flicts, as dri­vers of­ten meet head-on at the nar­rowed sec­tion, nei­ther want­i­ng to yield.

With schools and a health cen­tre in the area, hun­dreds re­ly on the road dai­ly. Ram­lo­gan called on Min­is­ter of Works and Trans­port Ro­han Sinanan to pri­ori­tise their plight, say­ing res­i­dents and taxi dri­vers are fed up af­ter sev­en years of wors­en­ing con­di­tions.

“We are no less im­por­tant than any­one else in Trinidad & To­ba­go. This road has de­te­ri­o­rat­ed to an un­bear­able state, and we have no choice but to take a stand,” he said.

Ram­lo­gan be­lieves the en­tire road­way is on the verge of col­lapse, as ex­posed soil at the land­slip’s edge sig­nals fur­ther ero­sion. Al­ready, large chunks of as­phalt break away when heavy trucks pass.

Guardian Me­dia has reached out to Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan and the MOWT for a re­sponse and is await­ing a re­ply.