Schoonord to Crane four-lane highway to create major service hub

As significant construction continues on the new Schoonord to Crane four-lane highway, Guyanese are already preparing for the substantial service hub that will be created in the area.

The thoroughfare will feature an emergency lane, medians, roundabouts, reinforced concrete culverts, and pre-stressed bridges to alleviate traffic congestion along the West Bank and West Coast of Demerara.

There is no doubt that when the project is completed, small vendors could begin offering services to premium hotels, apartment buildings, or possibly, engineering and welding shops along the stretch.

President, Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali believes these components will contribute to the overall ecosystem being developed around the area in the future.

President Ali inspected the ongoing works at the Region Three location Saturday last, which he said is moving apace.

“We do not want to have too many connections. There must be main connections to the highway because this is going to be a main express highway… the work is moving apace,” Dr Ali noted.

President, Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali inspected projects in Region Three at the weekend

He said the roadway will reduce the cost of production, and improve the type of economic activities and the value chain of lands within the area.

“So, the first phase is to reduce the traffic load… the time and man hours that we lose spending in traffic and that is what the first phase is aimed at doing.

When you hit on this highway, you will be saving a lot of time now. Between the Vreed-en-Hoop junction to the stelling, people sometimes lose close to two hours in a day, going and coming” he explained.

While the works are ongoing the ministries of Public Works and Housing and Water are working on the interconnections along the highway.

The president explained that the project faced some challenges, but alternative measures were implemented to ensure the work continues, which now sees a 24-hour operation.  

“There are many difficulties with this project… the movement of sand and the availability of material. A lot of the sand had to be barged in and then trucked to the site. And then all these were mud dams that had to be created to a hard surface to get the material in, so it’s a lot of technical work and then they have the problem with the traffic and the constraints on the bridge,” he explained. The project is divided into eight lots and is being executed by VR Construction Inc, Avinash Contracting & Scrap Metal Inc, L-Heureuse Construction and Services Inc, Guyamerica Construction Inc, AJM Enterprise, Vals Construction, Puran Bros Disposal Inc, and JS Guyana Inc.

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