$10 Million to be spent on infrastructure in Belize City

As is traditional whenever Prime Minister Dean Barrow makes an appearance, he was bombarded with any number of issues. But his presence at the Radisson today was actually so he could make a very important announcement – one which will no doubt be welcomed by city residents, even if it gets frowns from other municipalities countrywide. Currently, one hundred and two major streets in Belize City have been cemented, and thanks to Central Government, that won’t be the end of the infrastructure works by a long shot. Phase one is complete, and in just a matter of days, phase two will get underway – it all translates to better streets and drains in a city which has already seen unprecedented improvement in little over a year.

Prime Minister Dean Barrow

Dean Barrow

“The absolutely splendid job that has been done, the way this city has been transformed, these are things that oblige the central government to partner with the mayor and his city council in trying to move things forward. And so my principal purpose in being here this afternoon is to say that with respect to phase two of the street concreting program that the mayor and the city council has undertaken, the central government is now going to contribute ten million dollars. Now of course, it is not going to be done all at once. It is going to be done in stages, but we are ready for the mayor to sign the initial contracts. He will get into the details of all the streets that are to be done and the implementation timeline, but we are ready to put up the mobilization fee for the first set of streets in the second phase that will be concreted.”

Darrell Bradley

Darrell Bradley, Belize City Mayor

“The second phase that the Prime Minister introduced will call for the concreting of thirty-five additional streets in accordance with the map. Those are the streets that are etched in blue; those in red are the streets that have already been concrete—that is phase one of the project. If you notice these streets and what we consider them, and I was corrected, that these are what we call primary streets. Many people often times ask why is it that you select one street or a series of streets versus other streets. It is because in line with the master plan project, we are trying to strategically build connectivity throughout Belize City so that when you look at streets like Freetown Road, like Orange Street, like Vernon Street, like Cemetery Road; these are streets that are important not only for the residents who live on those streets, but for the overall strategic development of Belize City.”

We’ll have much more on phase two of the infrastructure project in Friday’s newscast.