WESTERN BUREAU:

The Urban Development Corporation (UDC) is currently working overtime to construct some six groynes that are expected to mitigate the further erosion of the Montego Bay shoreline, which is constantly under threat from flooding associated with climate change activities.

Omar Simpson, the western regional manager of the UDC, says approximately $200 million is currently being spent to rehabilitate the Montego Bay shoreline to prevent future flood under phase one of the project.

The first phase of the rehabilitation project involves the construction of four groynes at the popular One Man Beach and the Walter Fletcher Beach, which are both located along the Jimmy Cliff Boulevard in the western city. Work on the project started last month and is expected to be completed within the first quarter of the 2021-2022 financial year.

Phase two of the project will see the construction of two groynes along the shoreline of the multimillion-dollar Harmony Beach Park, which was officially opened to the public in May of this year, albeit with limited access as a result of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

“More than 30 years have passed, so they need some rehabilitation,” said Simpson, in regard to the groynes which the UDC created several decades ago to keep the citizens of Montego Bay safe and to prevent the city from flooding.

Groynes are walls or barriers made of wood, stone, concrete, steel, and fabric bags filled with sand, which are built perpendicularly to the shorelines to trap and absorb sand moving in long-shore currents.

“Now with the advent of rising sea levels, the advent of climate change, changes in weather patterns, and more aggressive storm forces, the shoreline is under pressure,” Simpson told The Gleaner.“We are currently conducting that project and we expect that project, which started at the end of November, to go through to May 2022.”

In 2017, Montego Bay experienced severe flooding as a result of excessively heavy rains, which lashed the city for about four hours, leaving several roadways blocked and significant damage to private and public properties in the business and residential districts of King Street, Dome Street, Williams Street, and Norwood.

A similar event took place earlier this year, when heavy rains left several businesses and residential homes inundated.