SHAR­LENE RAM­PER­SAD

The Pri­or­i­ty Bus Route (PBR) has been par­tial­ly opened af­ter hours of heavy traf­fic in and out of Port-of-Spain along the high­way and East­ern Main Road this morn­ing as the Min­istry of Works con­tin­ues work on the new Sea Lots walkover.

Ac­cord­ing to a re­lease from the min­istry, the PBR was opened be­tween the in­ter­sec­tions of Ab­ba­toir Road in Port-of-Spain and the Mt Hope in­ter­sec­tion.

How­ev­er, on­ly “light” mo­tor ve­hi­cles will be al­lowed to use the PBR at this time.

Ear­li­er this week, the min­istry an­nounced that the Beetham High­way, be­tween Barataria and the Port-of-Spain Light­house on Wright­son Road, would be closed from 9 pm on Fri­day to 6 pm on Sun­day.

Dozens of mo­torists took to so­cial me­dia to vent their frus­tra­tion over the pile-up, with one dri­ver say­ing a trip that usu­al­ly takes her five min­utes to com­plete by car, had tak­en 45 min­utes due to the traf­fic.

Pho­tos show­ing long lines of traf­fic along the La­dy Young Road were al­so post­ed.

Those caught in the dead­lock have this ad­vice: “Stay out of town.”

Al­ter­na­tive routes

If you do have to go in­to or out of Port-of-Spain, here is a re­minder of al­ter­na­tive routes to be used dur­ing this pe­ri­od: • East­bound Traf­fic—Please turn left on­to Broad­way; as no ac­cess would be al­lowed to pass the Light­house. The west­bound lanes of the Beetham High­way will be con­vert­ed to two-way traf­fic be­tween the Light­house and Pi­o­neer Dri­ve to fa­cil­i­tate ac­cess/egress for lo­cal traf­fic on­ly.

• Beetham—There will be no ac­cess per­mit­ted along the west­bound lanes of the Beetham High­way be­yond the Barataria Over­pass. On­ly lo­cal traf­fic ac­cess­ing De­vel­op­ment Dri­ve will be per­mit­ted. Al­ter­na­tive ac­cess in­to Port-of-Spain and en­vi­rons would be al­lowed via the use of the Barataria Over­pass where­by mo­torists can utilise the Pri­or­i­ty Bus Route, the East­ern Main Road or the La­dy Young Road, Mor­vant.

• Beetham—Lo­cal traf­fic will be per­mit­ted to ac­cess De­vel­op­ment Dri­ve from the west­bound lanes of the Beetham High­way. Lo­cal traf­fic head­ing east­bound from De­vel­op­ment Dri­ve would be al­lowed to pro­ceed east along the east­bound lanes of the Beetham High­way. No ac­cess to the Beetham High­way will be per­mit­ted from Abat­toir Road and Pro­duc­tion Dri­ve.