Toll protest off
Portmore community leaders yesterday called off a planned protest of the Portmore toll road, saying that its inadequacies have already been demonstrated by recent incidents of traffic pile-up and that they would prefer, instead, to focus on pressing the Government to lower the toll rates.
The protest, which was scheduled for tomorrow, would have required all residents of Portmore to use the toll road, a move that would lead to further congestion during the morning rush hour.
But yesterday, Byron Buckley, president of the All Hellshire Leadership Council, said the community leaders did “not want to further inconvenience fellow residents”.
“There were about three incidents on the highway that made it clear that it couldn’t take a lot of vehicles,” Buckley told the Sunday Observer yesterday. “So we say that point has been made already. So what is the sense of trying to underscore that?”
He said that based on this, the community leaders have decided to focus on a petition which reflects the general feeling of the public, based on a recent poll. This, he said, was the core issue which needed to be addressed.
“The community leaders. are focusing on getting Portmore residents to sign a petition to the prime minister requesting the lowering of the toll rates,” Buckley said in a news release. “This is especially in light of recent poll findings showing that most Portmore residents think the toll rates are unaffordable.”
The toll road has been mired in controversy ever since the Government announced its construction and moreso since its official opening on July 15 this year.
Portmore residents, opposed to paying to use the road, had fought a bitter battle with the Government, with the case even going to court, which ruled in favour of the Government.
The residents then demanded that the toll authorities not charge more than $30 per car to use the road. However, the toll road operators set the rates at $60 for motor cars and $200 for trucks and buses.
On the Monday following the opening of the toll road, far more Portmore motorists used the Mandela Highway alternative, maintaining an announced boycott of the toll but paying the price in painfully long traffic delays.
But with opposition to the toll road obviously waning, the Portmore Citizens Advisory Committee (PCAC) called on all residents of the municipality to use the road on October 23 to press their point that if all the vehicles that were travelling via the Mandela Highway were to divert to the toll road the traffic congestion occurring on the road would have been considerably worse.
“We want to make a point by using the toll road all at once on October 23, to show that the boycott is still in effect and that the toll road could not manage all the vehicles if we were not using Mandela,” PCAC president Yvonne McCormack told the Sunday Observer earlier this month.
Yesterday, Buckley said that while the latest decision to call off the Monday morning protest was not taken at one of the general town meetings, the community leadership is empowered in between meetings to make strategic changes.
In his news release Buckley asked residents wishing to sign the petition to contact the leadership of their citizens’ association.
“The petition will be presented to Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller next month,” he said.
He admitted that getting signatures for the petition has been going slower than expected, but said this should intensify over the next two weeks.
Majority of the signatories for the petition are collected by going door-to-door, but Buckley said there are plans to hold mass signings at busy thoroughfares such as the shopping plazas.