The Pri­or­i­ty Bus Route will be opened tonight to mo­torists as the Min­istry of Works and Trans­port moves to shut down the Beetham High­way, be­tween Barataria and Port-of-Spain, for ma­jor work on the new Sea Lots walkover.

The de­ci­sion to free up the fa­cil­i­ty will help ease the ma­jor traf­fic de­lays ex­pect­ed on the Churchill-Roo­sevelt High­way.

The Beetham High­way, be­tween Barataria and the Port-of-Spain Light­house on Wright­son Road, will be closed to­day be­gin­ning from 9 pm and end­ing at 6 pm Sun­day.

Works and Trans­port Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan told the T&T Guardian yes­ter­day that the Pri­or­i­ty Bus Route will stay open for the du­ra­tion of the work.

The clo­sure is to fa­cil­i­tate the place­ment of the pedes­tri­an over­pass su­per struc­ture.

The min­istry ad­vised that the Beetham High­way will be closed to all ve­hic­u­lar traf­fic dur­ing this pe­ri­od in or­der to fa­cil­i­tate the com­ple­tion of the ma­jor work on the over­pass.

Mo­torists were ad­vised to use these al­ter­na­tive routes 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.

In light of this, the min­istry ad­vised mo­torists of the fol­low­ing safe­ty is­sues:

• Pro­ceed with cau­tion and ob­serve all di­rec­tion­al signs and bar­ri­ers

• Com­ply with in­struc­tions from Po­lice Of­fi­cers on site to fa­cil­i­tate a safe and or­der­ly flow of traf­fic

• Be aware of heavy equip­ment en­ter­ing and ex­it­ing the site

• Dri­ve with cau­tion on all milled (pos­si­bly un­even) sur­faces.