Bamboo pile-up at Riley, Kew bridges could cause flooding

Western Bureau:

Residents of Lucea and Kew, in Hanover, are now in imminent danger of being flooded out as a result of a pile-up of bamboo at the Riley and Kew bridges, which could prevent the free flow of water should it rain heavily for any protracted period.

When The Gleaner visited both locations on Monday, it was observed that the flow of water was being impeded by the pile-up of bamboo underneath the old Kew Bridge, which is a short distance away from the Riley River, which is also blocked, where it is supposed to flow under the Riley Bridge at the entrance to Lucea from the direction of Montego Bay.

Because of the potential for flooding, residents in Kew and Lucea are now worried as they know that once it rains heavily, both rivers will quickly become a threat to life and property, a factor that has not escape councillors at the Hanover Municipal Corporation (HMC), who are equally worried about the situation.

In a recent interview with The Gleaner, Lucea Mayor Sheridan Samuels said the National Works Agency (NWA) was responsible for clearing the blockage under the two bridges. Samuels, however, admitted that, while it is not their responsibility, in the past, the HMC has had to clear the Riley Bridge as an emergency project to prevent the flooding of Lucea.

“They (the NWA) know about the situation, I have informed them, and they pass both locations every day. They have been promising to do the work, but nothing is happening,” said Samuels, who further noted that the HMC does not have the funding to take on projects such as clearing the two bridges, hence the need for the NWA to meets its obligations.

Work to start next week

Last week, in the aftermath of an incident in which residents, who were protesting the killing of a resident by police, set fire to a section of the Riley Bridge, Janel Ricketts, the NWA’s community relations officer for western Jamaica, told The Gleaner that plans are in place to clear the bamboo clogging the two bridges.

“We have developed a schedule to do the work, and the contract has been signed,” Ricketts said. “We are anticipating that the work will start sometime next week.”

However, when The Gleaner visited both locations yesterday, the situation had not changed, which has left Councillor Daren Barnes, who represents the Riverside division, where the Kew community is located, deeply concerned, if not frustrated.

“With the amount of bamboo that is stuck in the vicinity of the old Kew bridge, if we should get some heavy continuous rainfall, I am sure that we are going to have some flooding in that community,” said Barnes. “There is a lot of bamboo in the river, a lot more than previous times, and while the NWA has promised to do some amount of clearing, nothing is being done.”

Barnes is also worried about the structural integrity of the Kew Bridge because, with the water backing up around its base and not flowing as freely as it should, the scope exists for erosion in the foundation of the bridge.

When The Gleaner visited the old Kew Bridge yesterday, there was a huge pile-up of bamboo stuck under the bridge, and another huge pile stretching some 20 metres up river, as there was no space for them to flow down-river.

“It’s one of two things that is going to happen, either the whole bridge is going to give way, or the river is going to come straight through our community,” a nervous resident told The Gleaner.

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