Kim­ber­ly Mack­han

There have been calls for the Gov­ern­ment to de­ploy a stronger po­lice pres­ence around the Di­vali Na­gar site in Ch­agua­nas to crack­down on in­dis­crim­i­nate park­ing along the south­bound lane of the Solomon Ho­choy High­way.

"By this week­end, you will have ve­hi­cles park­ing on both sides of the high­way and in the cen­tre be­tween the di­vider and it is to­tal­ly dan­ger­ous and this is where we need a greater po­lice pres­ence," said Ch­agua­nas coun­cil­lor Gopaul Bood­han, who lost the bor­ough's re­cent elec­tions for may­or. "Even this (Thurs­day) evening, there was traf­fic up to Grand Bazaar, bumper to bumper, for peo­ple who were go­ing South. That is un­fair to peo­ple. It is to­tal­ly un­fair. The po­lice should be more in­volved be­cause this (Di­vali cel­e­bra­tions at the Na­gar) is a big event in Trinidad and To­ba­go and Hin­dus, Mus­lims, every­one goes to the Di­vali Na­gar.

Bood­han said so af­ter a meet­ing of the Friends of Ch­agua­nas at Gas­ton Court, Lange Park Thurs­day night. Bood­han ex­pressed dis­ap­point­ment over the failed im­ple­men­ta­tion of a pro­pos­al he cre­at­ed to ad­dress traf­fic woes from vis­i­tors to the Di­vali Na­gar. "They (Gov­ern­ment) should have stepped in a very long while ago. We know year af­ter year that you will have (cel­e­bra­tions) at the Di­vali Na­gar site and you will have like 100,000 peo­ple or so com­ing in­to the Di­vali Na­gar." He called on au­thor­i­ties to trans­form the old trans­mit­ter sta­tion for 610 ra­dio in­to a car park for Di­vali Na­gar pa­trons. He al­so rec­om­mend­ed that the road be­tween the old trans­mit­ter sta­tion and the Di­vali Na­gar be re­paired and opened to fa­cil­i­tate mo­torists.