A group of Preysal res­i­dents fear their com­mu­ni­ty may be in of be­ing cut off as part of the main ac­cess road­way has caved in, leav­ing an eight-feet deep hole near the Preysal Bridge.

The pave­ment where chil­dren walk every day on their way to school now al­so has no sup­port un­der it and can sink in at any time. The rail­ing along the near­by bridge has al­so giv­en way and cracks have start­ed de­vel­op­ing in hous­es and walls near the erod­ed bridge.

Frus­trat­ed with the lack of re­sponse from Gov­ern­ment, res­i­dents, led by the Preysal Com­mu­ni­ty Ac­tion Al­liance, staged a plac­ard protest to high­light the prob­lem ear­li­er to­day.

Al­liance pres­i­dent Mi­ran­da Mo­hammed said the ero­sion start­ed a year ago but was ex­ac­er­bat­ed by re­cent rains and flood­ing.

Preysal residents at the site of the caved in road armed with their placards for the protest earlier today.

Rishi Ragoonath

"We have raised this with the MP and the re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tion and noth­ing was done. We are call­ing on the Min­is­ter of Works to fix the Preysal Bridge now be­cause it is a dis­as­ter wait­ing to hap­pen."

She al­so said the San Fran­cis­co bridge off Chick­land has al­so been dam­aged.

"The wall of the bridge dam­aged, the Preysal bridge is on the verge of col­lapse and the Chor­ro Bridge is al­so be­ing erod­ed," Mo­hammed said.

Res­i­dents are wor­ried that the 4,000 of them who live in the com­mu­ni­ty may soon be cut off.

Sal­ly Pragg, who lives next to the bridge, said her wall is lean­ing be­cause of the ero­sion.

"Since De­cem­ber 2016 we no­ticed the bridge was be­ing erod­ed but now it is worse. Some­one can fall in­to that hole and die," she said.

Res­i­dent Shir­van Ramjit al­so said stu­dents from the Preysal High School, Preysal Gov­ern­ment Pri­ma­ry school and two preschools in the area pass on the erod­ing bridge every day and it is now a haz­ard for them.

The T&T Guardian will bring you more as this sto­ry de­vel­ops.