RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

For more than two years, res­i­dents of St John’s Branch Trace, Av­o­cat, en­dured the dai­ly hard­ship of car­ry­ing gro­ceries and garbage across a flood­gate to reach their homes. When some­one fell ill, they had to re­ly on a boat to cross the riv­er.

For the 40 res­i­dents, par­tic­u­lar­ly the el­der­ly, the col­lapse of the bridge on Ju­ly 10, 2024, turned or­di­nary tasks in­to dif­fi­cult and dis­tress­ing jour­neys.

On Fri­day, two years and three months lat­er, res­i­dents fi­nal­ly re­gained ve­hic­u­lar ac­cess to their homes with the open­ing of a new Bai­ley bridge. Some held back tears as they re­called the hard­ships they had en­dured.

Res­i­dent Leena Seep­er­sad said the ex­pe­ri­ence had been ex­treme­ly dif­fi­cult. Res­i­dents had to park their ve­hi­cles away from their homes and car­ry gro­ceries across the flood­gate.

“For two years we suf­fered. We had to go over the flood­gate car­ry­ing our gro­ceries in bags to get to our homes. We had to park the cars out of the road­way. It was very dif­fi­cult,” she said.

An­oth­er res­i­dent, Seukaran Prem­c­hand, said the sit­u­a­tion be­came par­tic­u­lar­ly chal­leng­ing when some­one fell ill and need­ed med­ical at­ten­tion. Res­i­dents had to use a boat to cross the riv­er, while el­der­ly peo­ple al­so strug­gled to ac­cess their med­ica­tion.

“They were hard times, and we re­al­ly can­not say how hap­py we are to fi­nal­ly get our bridge,” Prem­c­hand said.

Fyz­abad MP Dav­en­dranath Tan­coo said res­i­dents were ex­cep­tion­al­ly hap­py to re­gain ac­cess to their homes with­out the dif­fi­cul­ties they had faced since the bridge col­lapsed.

He said that, af­ter the col­lapse, then Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ter Faris Al-Rawi and Works Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan did not see the need for a re­place­ment bridge be­cause the com­mu­ni­ty was not large.

Tan­coo said the fight to re­store ac­cess be­gan un­der his pre­de­ces­sor, Dr Lack­ram Bo­doe, who led ef­forts to have the bridge re­placed.

“Peo­ple were dis­en­fran­chised, and Dr Bo­doe fought hard for his peo­ple who were suf­fer­ing. I was priv­i­leged to be able to con­tin­ue the charge,” he said.

Tan­coo said the new bridge would re­store ac­cess for res­i­dents and sup­port agri­cul­tur­al ac­tiv­i­ty in the area, where crops are grown to sup­ply St John’s and oth­er parts of T&T.

Works and In­fra­struc­ture Min­is­ter Jear­lean John said she un­der­stood the chal­lenges of liv­ing in re­mote com­mu­ni­ties, hav­ing come from Char­lotte. She said the bridge rep­re­sent­ed more than the restora­tion of in­fra­struc­ture.

“This bridge is not just a bridge, it’s a bridge of hope, it’s a life­line,” she said.

“When we look at these things, we are not, me, for in­stance, sit­ting in the min­istry, I’m not see­ing a piece of in­fra­struc­ture to be re­stored. I’m see­ing your life be­ing dis­rupt­ed.”

John said that af­ter she as­sumed re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for the min­istry, Tan­coo con­tin­ued to raise the res­i­dents’ plight with her. She com­mend­ed NID­CO for com­plet­ing the pro­cure­ment process and de­liv­er­ing the bridge ahead of the time al­lo­cat­ed for con­struc­tion.

The new bridge spans just over 30 me­tres and has an an­ti-skid deck. John said the project al­so in­clud­ed about 70 me­tres of open box drain and an­oth­er 70 me­tres of tur­bine sleep­er drain.

She urged res­i­dents to ob­serve the bridge’s load and speed lim­its, keep garbage out of the wa­ter­way, and re­port any dam­age or prob­lems.

Bo­doe re­called the morn­ing of Ju­ly 10, 2024, when about 40 peo­ple and sev­en ve­hi­cles were strand­ed. He said the col­lapse had been alarm­ing, and one sick res­i­dent who could not ac­cess med­ical ser­vices had to cross by boat.

He com­mend­ed res­i­dents for their pa­tience and re­silience, say­ing the new bridge would bring much-need­ed re­lief to the com­mu­ni­ty.

Siparia May­or Dood­nath Mayrhoo said im­proved ac­cess could sup­port plans for eco­tourism and a her­itage site in the area. He added that the com­mu­ni­ty’s nat­ur­al at­trac­tions could be de­vel­oped fur­ther.