Stephon Nicholas

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

Pub­lic In­fra­struc­ture Sec­re­tary Nathisha Charles-Pan­tin says the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) has been car­ry­ing out patch­ing and paving works across the is­land as part of on­go­ing ef­forts to im­prove the road net­work.

Charles-Pan­tin said the fo­cus has been on high-traf­fic cor­ri­dors, pri­or­i­ty com­mu­ni­ty roads and ar­eas in ur­gent need of at­ten­tion.

Speak­ing at a post-Ex­ec­u­tive Coun­cil brief­ing in Scar­bor­ough yes­ter­day, she said the di­vi­sion will soon un­der­take a com­pre­hen­sive road-con­di­tion as­sess­ment to bet­ter guide re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion ef­forts.

“We are ful­ly aware of the ex­tent of work re­quired on To­ba­go’s road net­work, and while we con­tin­ue to pro­vide short-term re­lief through patch­ing and paving, this as­sess­ment will en­sure re­sources are di­rect­ed where they are most need­ed,” she said.

Charles-Pan­tin added that her di­vi­sion has been tasked by Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine to im­prove ac­cess to the new ANR Robin­son In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port, specif­i­cal­ly along the route con­nect­ing the Win­ston Mur­ray Boule­vard, Kil­gwyn By­pass and the ter­mi­nal ac­cess road.

Au­gus­tine said the air­port is ex­pect­ed to be ready by Ju­ly/Au­gust, with a pos­si­ble grand open­ing in time for the Oc­to­ber Car­ni­val.

Charles-Pan­tin not­ed that be­cause part of the project area is con­sid­ered wet­lands, the di­vi­sion will col­lab­o­rate with the In­sti­tute of Ma­rine Af­fairs and the Di­vi­sion of En­vi­ron­ment be­fore con­struc­tion be­gins.

She said im­prov­ing traf­fic man­age­ment and pedes­tri­an safe­ty, par­tic­u­lar­ly around school zones, will al­so be ad­dressed, high­light­ing pri­or­i­ty ar­eas such as the Bon Ac­cord Pri­ma­ry School and the Ma­son Hall school zone.