Yvonne Ba­boolal

A sus­pen­sion bridge in Blan­chisseuse, more than a cen­tu­ry old, has been con­demned and re­placed by a mod­ern Bai­ley bridge at a cost of $2.7 mil­lion. The sus­pen­sion bridge is one of on­ly two in the coun­try and will be pre­served, Works and In­fra­struc­ture Min­is­ter Jack Warn­er promised yes­ter­day as he of­fi­cial­ly opened the new Bai­ley Bridge.

Warn­er said the sus­pen­sion bridge would be re­paired and used on­ly for foot traf­fic. He praised of­fi­cials of the min­istry who, in just over two months, were able to come up with this bridge for Blan­chisseuse. Warn­er was ad­dress­ing a small gath­er­ing un­der a tent that in­clud­ed act­ing Tourism Min­is­ter Win­ston "Gyp­sy" Pe­ters, Ari­ma MP Rodger Samuel, Min­istry of Works of­fi­cials and vil­lagers.

There was the set­back of some iron be­ing stolen from the new bridge, which cost the min­istry be­tween $30,000 and $40,000 to re­place, he said. Loney Charles, an 82-year old mem­ber of the Blan­chisseuse vil­lage coun­cil, thanked Warn­er for the speedy erec­tion of the Bai­ley bridge. "It is the first time that Blan­chisseuse got a project done so quick­ly," she not­ed.

Charles seized the op­por­tu­ni­ty to re­mind Warn­er that there was a road in the area of the 67-mile post, where four peo­ple died in a car ac­ci­dent in May 1998, that al­so needs re­pair­ing. "The cau­tion tape is still there, and two drums," she said dur­ing a short ad­dress.

Fur­ther, she is al­so hop­ing to see some­thing done about the di­lap­i­dat­ed Ari­ma/Blan­chisseuse Road, she said. Warn­er promised Charles he would com­plete the road by No­vem­ber 18, her 83rd birth­day, as a gift to her. Joseph Esau, an­oth­er vil­lage rep­re­sen­ta­tive, said the sus­pen­sion bridge is "very pret­ty" and re­mains of his­tor­i­cal and aes­thet­ic val­ue to res­i­dents.

The bridge was the on­ly form of ac­cess for vil­lagers who cul­ti­vat­ed land be­yond it and for a num­ber of res­i­dents liv­ing across the riv­er, he said. It was al­so an ac­cess route for ma­jor hik­ing and en­vi­ron­men­tal ac­tiv­i­ties on the North Coast, and, in­di­rect­ly, served all of T&T, he said.

The wood­en planks are now rot­ten and no longer fit for use, he said. The sus­pen­sion bridge be­came too dan­ger­ous for traf­fic and to ex­pen­sive to main­tain. He said it was re­placed by the Bai­ley bridge which will pro­vide im­proved ac­cess to vil­lagers, farm­ers and hik­ers.

Samuel said no ma­jor road­works had been done in the Ari­ma con­stituen­cy, which in­cludes Blan­chisseuse, parts of La Fil­lette and Heights of Aripo, for 30 years. "Ari­ma has been aban­doned all this time. Af­ter 28 years we have been able to build a bridge," he said. Pe­ters said the new Bai­ley bridge will en­hance food se­cu­ri­ty by giv­ing farm­ers easy ac­cess to their lands.