Hope on horizon for Troy after 3 years of hardship
New bridge expected to be completed in months
Published:Tuesday | November 12, 2024 | 12:09 AMLeon Jackson/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
With Prime Minister Andrew Holness visiting Troy in Trelawny Southern last week to personally inspect the site of the collapsed bridge, residents are feeling more hopeful than ever that a new structure will be erected to ease the strain they have been enduring since August 2021.
Holness assured them that a new bridge will be built and ready for use by mid-2025 and, for many, that promise is the light at the end of a long and difficult tunnel.
Having grown up with the Troy bridge as a constant presence, 85-year-old George Bromfield never imagined a time when it would no longer be there.
But that all changed in August 2021 when the century-old structure collapsed, severing Troy’s connection to neighbouring districts in Trelawny and the adjoining parish of Manchester. It was the first time in his life that Bromfield could not travel freely between communities.
“Growing up, I never paid any mind to the bridge. Even in adult life, you took it for granted that the bridge would always be there,” he told The Gleaner.
“I was getting ready to go to Santa Cruz when I realised the bridge had collapsed,” he said of the changed reality after the passage of Tropical Storm Grace in 2021. “I had to take the long journey to Mandeville to Santa Cruz and back. Since then, it has been hardship on Troy residents.”
LONG JOURNEYING HOURS
Bromfield, a deacon at the Troy Baptist Church, noted that what once was a short trek for him now takes several hours.
“A member of the church died. She lived in Cowick Park, which is a 10-minute walk from the bridge. We have no resident pastor at the church, so I conducted the funeral. I had to go all the way to Mandeville and down to Balaclava before reaching Cowick Park,” said Bromfield.
Jonathan Campbell, the bursar at Troy High School who lives just a short walk from the school on the other side of the bridge, has had to take a 360-degree detour since the collapse, adding both time and expense to his daily commute.
“In the early part after the bridge collapsed, I used to drive. I no longer drive because the cost of petrol and the road condition was too much,” said Campbell, who has had to resort to public transportation. “There are times when I reach home at 8 p.m. It is very hard to live where I live and work at the high school. I have considered relocating but that is like starting life all over. I am hoping that sooner rather than later something will be done.”
Campbell is just one of the many persons attached to schools in Troy that have been badly affected by the collapse of the bridge and have been forced to make major adjustments to their daily lives.
STUDENT TRANSFERS
According to Kareme Frater, principal of Troy Primary School, student attendance has dropped from 230 to 203 since the bridge collapsed, as students who once lived on the opposite side have transferred to schools closer to home.
“Thirty of my students have transferred to Balaclava Primary School, and they can’t wait to see the bridge replaced so they can come back,” said Frater, who noted that those students were within walking distance from the school before the bridge collapsed. “Some parents still have their children attending but they have to cross over on crates attached to a zip line.”
Farmers Rochester Lewis and Kevin Robinson, who used to look forward to handsome returns from their yam, cocoa and carrot crops, are now facing a major hurdle as, with no bridge, they are cut off from their primary markets from Balaclava to Santa Cruz.
“Since the bridge break down, we have it hard. It is a struggle to pencil out how we going to make ends meet,” said Robinson, who said transportation costs have skyrocketed. “The truck man dem a bathe [in money] ... . Him charge extra to go on the long journey. Sometimes we have to trust (credit) out the food, so we don’t make two trips per week.”