Drainage not being considered in major road works

Dear Editor,

I thank Mr Rockliffe (`Land-grabbing on the parapets’ SN Feb 19, 2014) for reminding me of my civic duty. I do not belong to any of the organisations he mentions, only to his Philosopher. I begin by sharing his grave concern for the zoning problems in the city and commend him for being specific.

The problem he identifies with the Survival supermarket at Vlissengen Road and Duncan Street is the gravest because it intensifies the traffic bottleneck at the junction of the adjacent bridge to Irving Street, a thing I have written about before.

I also would like to share the concern of C. E. Wilkinson on the frequency and extent of pile driving in the city. I have commented before about the effect buildings greater than 3 storeys have on the surrounding buildings while the Reaz Trading building was affecting the neighbours. A British trained civil engineer employed in the City Engineer’s Dept. of the Georgetown M&CC explained to me in 1972 the reason there were then hardly any 4-storey buildings.

Our coastal clays should only permit pile driving for wharves, where the distortions created are localized by the softness of the immediate surroundings. When piles were driven in the dry season for the building being presently completed at Sheriff and Garnett Streets, Campbellville, I felt them a kilometer away in Lamaha Gardens. If high rise buildings are desired, then (high speed) drilling rigs or the like should be procured to drill the holes to pour reinforced concrete for the supports when they reach the continental shelf.

The other grave problem I have is drainage. Our canals and trenches on the Atlantic coast have 2 main functions:

1.       as a catchment to collect runoff water when it rains, and

2.       as drains to the major drains which eventually drain into the Atlantic at low tide.

Properly operated kokers and pumps facilitate this. Therefore drains and canals must be kept clean and unblocked of silt, vegetation, and garbage. However, the prerequisite for this is that the drains must exist or be created.

If it is as simple as I have outlined why therefore is the large trench on the eastern side of the East Bank Demerara road being filled to make another carriageway? I should like to have the civil engineer who signed off on this decision explain. Or was it a politician?

My mistrust has been fuelled by my experience at the Sheriff Street/Mandela Avenue expansion project consultation which I attended at the North Ruimveldt Multilateral School on 17th and 18th December 2013. On the first day I spent a lot of time getting thoroughly acquainted with the project and putting my initial questions in writing, together with my contact address. I was assured that my questions would be answered the following day at the plenary session by persons qualified and authorized to do so, and I was urged to come.

The next day I showed up at the time advertised, had to register again, and had to wait for the late start. Mr. Rabindranauth Chandarpal’s presentation was lucid even though it was unnecessary for me who got the information the previous day. Ms. Vanda Radzik’s presentation was long and left me wondering whether the exercise was really a consultation, or simply to satisfy the bureaucrats dispensing the funds that the event was held and so many people attended. The presentation on the wall was already plain to see for all who took the trouble to study it.

When eventually I was allowed to ask questions there were no proper answers forthcoming. Basic study of the drainage was obviously not done. I was solemnly promised by the organizers that my questions would be answered within the week. A week later was Christmas. No answer again. Maybe they were celebrating God’s gift to man.

Now it is Mashramani. Still no answer. Contrary to your Saturday Scene’s insightful columnist Jairo Rodrigues, they must be definitely celebrating a job well done in their reckoning. For they are as much unbeholden to me as the East Bank Road building authorities and city planners are to previous writers, and there is nothing I can do about it except write, pray for the Cooperative Republic, and suffer the floods when they come.

  Yours faithfully,

  Alfred Bhulai