Years after its initiation, the access road to the sanitary landfill at Haags Bosch, East Bank Demerara, is estimated to be 75 per cent complete, Head of the Georgetown Solid Waste Management Project,Satchel Paige Indians Jersey, Gordon Gilkes,Joshua Kimmich Jersey, has reported.Addressing members of the media last Friday during a press briefing at the Ministry of Communities, Fort Street,Mauricio Pinilla Jersey, Kingston, Gilkes said that the road was intended to have a 15-year lifespan but at present it is currently overstressed.The contract for building the roadway was signed in May 2009, by the former administration with H. Nauth and Sons Civil Engineering Contracts.The funding was part of the US$18M loan agreement the then government made with the Inter-American Development Bank, through a partnership approach to develop the landfill which replaced the Mandela Avenue dump in Le Repentir, Georgetown.The Ministry then had reported that of five bidders,Dick Butkus Bears Throwback Jersey, H. Nauth and Sons were successful and the project of building the access road was agreed upon with a five-month deadline, according to a report carried in the Guyana Chronicle on May 30, 2009.“That road is not completed,” Gilkes said adding that though it had been started years ago it currently stands at 75 per cent completion. The Project head said that its completion is the responsibility of the contractors.According to him the road was designed by consultants to last about 15 years with maintenance but that did not materialize. Gilkes said that the road was constructed on a navigation dam for cane harvesters with intentions of taking traffic to and from the Haags Bosch Landfill Site.He said at present there are some draglines on site,Pat Tillman Cardinals Jersey, and trucks, but as time went by there was additional “stress” on the road. “When we started the contract, BK International in association with Puran Bros, requested of the Ministry to use some of the clay on the road for sea defence.”He said that the requested was granted but the trucks used by BK International during that time did much damage to the road.“The road has been over stressed over the period of time and that is why it wasn’t completed. Even more recently, if you look at the records,Brandon Dubinsky Jersey, over the past month or so that road has been traversing in excess of 3000 trucks per month, carrying a total of 40,000 tonnes of garbage or debris so the roads were overstressed.”He told members of the media that even some of the large trucks from Bai Shan Lin and BK International were carrying somewhere between 40,000 – 45,000 tonnes. The Project head emphasised that the road was not designed for that type of pressure. |