Cable television and Internet connections were severed on Tuesday when contractors working on the $3.4 billion Baha Mar project accidentally sliced through the fiber optic cable, knocking most of Cable Beach offline for several hours.
Curiously, both major daily newspapers failed to even mention the incident.
Instead, Baha Mar Senior Vice President of Government and External Affairs Robert Sands was bragging to a local newspaper that the re-routing of West Bay Street and the construction of the commercial village for the resort is almost half-completed.
That news didn’t excite residents of Cable Beach who also saw electrical power knocked out for many hours last week, possibly as a result of Baha Mar’s ambitious construction schedule.
Later this summer, Cable Beach residents will have to deal with the re-routing of traffic as they make their way to and from downtown. Traffic will be routed to move around the site of the future ‘core’ project development.
Delays and traffic jams are expected.
If all that isn’t enough of an inconvenience, China State Construction Engineering Corporation (CSCEC) got started securing the site early this month, and is creating a ‘man-camp’, expected to house up to 4,000 workers during peak production periods.
No one has yet explained how the current electrical, water and sewerage facilities will be able to handle such a massive influx of demand prior to new facilities being created.
Another aspect of the construction project that is annoying Cable Beach residents are the recklessly speeding dump trucks, racing back and forth on Bay Street, hurrying to dump their loads and pick up another.
The drivers obviously get paid per load and their careless disregard for the safety of pedestrians and other motorists is an accident waiting to happen.
Let’s hope that it doesn’t take the death of a tourist, trying to cross the road, to get Baha Mar to slow the trucks down.
Meanwhile, Baha Mar Senior Vice President of Government and External Affairs Robert Sands, speaking to a local newspaper said that Baha Mar was meeting all of the requisite environmental, health and safety protocols.
Hmmm.
