Negril hoteliers bemoan traffic hold-up from SIA
Published:Tuesday | January 9, 2024 | 12:10 AMAlbert Ferguson/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
Grateful, but not good enough. That’s the view of hoteliers and other members of the Negril business community in Westmoreland and Hanover, who bemoaned the deplorable road network and traffic dilemma visitors are facing in getting to their destination.
To lessen the impact of the traffic situation on the tourism industry during the current winter season, the National Works Agency (NWA) implemented major traffic changes, including converting the Willie Delisser Drive in Lucea, Hanover, from a one-way traffic system to accommodate two lanes of traffic travelling in either direction.
Other changes include the provision of turning lanes in the vicinity of Main Street, Willie Delisser Boulevard, and Church Street and its intersection with Willie Delisser Drive in the northern coastal town. Main Street, Malcolm Heights and Miller’s Drive, in and around the town, have since been repaired to provide ease of movement.
But as the bumper season progresses, those changes do not appear to be sufficient to prevent tourists and locals from being gridlocked for hours.
“The people are spending too long on the roads from the airport to get to their destination, Negril,” said Elaine Allen Bradley, president of the Negril Chamber of Commerce and Industry (NCCI).
“I was at Riu Hotel recently and people were saying they cannot believe that after sitting for hours on a plane, they have to sit hours in a bus to get to their destination.”
Despite being grateful for the work done in attempting to ease the traffic issues, Allen-Bradley says more needs to be done.
“And a lot of them (tourists), especially those from England, they are dying to get to the beach, and they sat hours in a bus, it’s not good enough and we need to improve that,” the NCCI president insisted.
While hotelier Dalton ‘Penny’ Hill welcomes the initiative, he believes that the traffic police in Hanover are not doing enough to facilitate seamless commute, especially for tour buses.
“It takes you from New York three hours (and 30 minutes) to fly to Jamaica and it takes you three hours from Montego Bay to drive to Negril. Now people are complaining bitterly,” Hill said.
“It’s helping a little bit, not as much as we would like. Hopewell is a disaster, and I don’t know what the traffic police in Hanover are doing. They are not doing a good job,” he said.
According to Hill, he has since decided not to let his guests travel the Lucea route, but instead go south up Long Hill and on to Savanna-la-Mar, and then to Negril.
“If we want to reach Negril on time from Montego Bay, we have to take that high-level road (Long Hill) and go via Savanna-la-Mar, this is the best route,” he stated.