Stagnant water and loads of garbage continue to fill up a gutter at a section of Rihanna Drive in Westbury Road, St Michael, and some residents are calling for the problem to be fixed as a matter of urgency.
The road, named after Barbados National Hero and international superstar and businesswoman Robyn Rihanna Fenty, is traversed by many tourists who delight in taking photographs outside her childhood home, a major attraction.
However, residents said for the past few years a gutter along the 0.3-kilometre road continues to be blocked and filled with stagnant water which is leading to mosquitoes, flies and a pungent smell.
They recalled it all began after the road was repaved some years back.
Pointing to the dirty gutter in front of her house, Tamara Todd, who has lived on Rihanna Drive all her life, said she believes a blockage is leading to the build-up of stagnant water.
“The road was done a few years ago and there was a problem here so they had to dig and build it back, but all of the stuff they would have done for the boxing, they left it under there and cement fell down in there as well. So the cement as well as the bad structure is what stopping the water from going any further,” she said, showing a covered area along the gutter.
Todd said it was flushed last month by the Barbados Fire Service but in a few days the water had backed up again.
“Someone from the Drainage Division came and I told her it is a structural problem,” she said, explaining that the gutter collects water coming down from President Kennedy Drive and sends it out to sea.
“This water is not going any further. They need to dig back up the road. I have been talking about this for years and I am tired,” she said.
“All I hearing is that the people out here dumping, them littering, but this amount of trash is a combination of so many different things. Yes, people litter, but when the wind is high it blows all the trash into this gutter.”
Dawn Johnson also pointed out that it was urgent to have the problem rectified as Rihanna Drive was supposed to be part of We Gatherin’ activities.
However, another resident questioned if the delay in dealing with that section was because it was not near to Rihanna’s childhood home where all the activity involving tourists takes place.
When contacted, Shamkoe Pile, communications specialist in the Ministry of Transport and Works, said the matter will be investigated but the street will be placed on the weekly cleaning schedule. (MB)
