MPI to open tenders for pedestrian, vehicular overpasses

With the aim of addressing the issues of heavy rush-hour traffic and the ongoing road carnage, the Public Infrastructure Ministry is moving ahead with plans to construct overhead vehicular and pedestrian crossings along the East Coast and East Bank roadways.

The project is funded via an Inter-American Development Bankd (IDB) loan and according to Head of Works Service Group (WSG), Geoffrey Vaughn, this is one of the major projects the Ministry will be embarking on this year.
He was at the time speaking at the Public Infrastructure Ministry’s end of year press conference during which he disclosed that tenders for the construction of the overhead road structures will be opened on January 10.
Vaughn added that tenders for supervision were already opened on December 6, 2016, and are currently being evaluated. “These projects are the first in Guyana and we are hoping that we get them right so we are putting all things in place to ensure that we don’t have any hiccups during this process,” the WSG Head noted.
In the 2017 Budget, Finance Minister Winston Jordan had stated that there will be a number of pedestrian over-passes at strategic points along the East Coast and East Bank Public Roads.
“As a means of promoting pedestrian safety while improving the flow of traffic, we will construct the first ever pedestrian over-passes in the country at Liliendaal, Houston, Eccles, and Peter’s Hall, as well as the first ever vehicle overpass at the Diamond main access road,” he outlined.
Meanwhile, it was outlined at the Public Infrastructure Ministry’s yearend press conference that several of the internationally funded projects were unable to get a start in 2016 but efforts are already apace to have them started.
According to Vaughn, the Sheriff-Mandela Avenue project was one such IDB-funded project that did not get off the ground last year. He explained that Government had decided to have a review of this project with it being nullified twice, once in 2015 and then in 2016.
“It was basically sent up for review which has been completed and that should be out for tendering at the end of this month, once we receive all the no objections,” Vaughn noted while adding that the project is currently before the IDB for no objection.
The review was conducted by the WSG Design Unit ,along with the consultant firm Egis in association with SRK Engineer. On the other hand, among the Civil Works Project undertaken by the IDB is the East Bank Berbice Road Project. Vaughn pointed out that they are awaiting the completion of the independent evaluation which is being executed by the Guyana Association of Professional Engineers.
Additionally, there are several IDB-funded studies that are at different stages of procurement and will likely commence as well as conclude this year. These include studies on the rehabilitation of the Linden-Seosdyke Highway; the upgrade of the Railway Embankment road; the upgrade of the alignment from Linden to Kwakwani, and the construction of a new bridge across the Demerara River at Wismar, Linden.
“Hopefully, when these studies are completed we will then move into the other stage of construction,” Vaughn posited.

Expansion projects
As it relates to the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) funded West Coast Demerara Road (WCDR) Improvement Project, 60 per cent of the 30.7 kilometres road works have been completed to date and the contractors are working to meet the 2018 deadline.
Apart from the road works spanning Vreed-en-Hoop to Hydronie WCDR Improvement project also comprised of several other components. These include road works supervision; monitoring and evaluation consultancy; school road safety education programme; community and driver road safety education, and road safety public relations and communications. The latter three are completed.
Moreover, with regards to the East Coast Expansion Project which has been on hold for almost two years, the WSG Head explained that the US$45 million loan agreement between the Guyana Government and China Exim Bank was signed in November 2016 for works to commence. Vaughn anticipates that the road works will recommence later this month. The project entails a four-lane expansion from Better Hope to Annadale and two-lane upgrade from Anandale to Belfield.
Government had already injected $2.7 billion into the project and complete preliminary works for the four-lane expansion. The works completed including sand filling and removal of utilities.
The contract for these works has been awarded to China Railway for a total sum of US$46 million.The supervising consultant is Shalida in joint venture with E&A Consultant firm.