Vaz says south coast highway opens up St Thomas for development

Daryl Vaz, the minister without portfolio in the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation, said the South Coast Highway Improvement Project "is by far the best thing to happen to the eastern end of the island in decades".

The road from Harbour View to Yallahs Bridge will be widened to four lanes to include new and improved alignments, while the existing main roads from Yallahs Bridge to Port Antonio and from Morant Bay to Cedar Valley will be rehabilitated. Some realignments will also be done on select sections of these corridors.

Vaz said that a key component of the project is that the upgrading of water infrastructure will be undertaken simultaneously.

Under the project, new transmission and distribution lines will be installed in areas where a supply network exists and will be directly impacted by the roadworks.

"Where there is water but it's not in the pipes, the pipes will be run to facilitate the water getting to the communities. Most importantly, where there is no water, provisions will be made to be able to pipe water to communities," Vaz said.

The Government will be spending US$195 million ($2.8 billion) to undertake road construction works under the project, which is slated to begin by the end of September.