FIREWORKS EXPECTED AT MEETING IN ST ANN’S BAY THURSDAY
North Coast Times Special Report
Interest is building well beyond St Ann in a meeting on Thursday, January 11, over a controversial, luxury housing development by the Chinese construction company, CHEC, on lands near Dunn’s River, part of the crucial watershed of St Ann and St Mary.
The Housing and Subdivision Development of Mammee Bay is to cover 160 acres (about 65 hectares) of the Roaring River/ Mammee Bay Estate. The Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is to be discussed at the public meeting at the St Ann’s Bay Baptist Church Hall, starting at 5:30, p.m. Thursday.
The housing development, by the China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC), if it goes ahead, will have 69 deluxe and standard three-bedroom units; nearly 200 one- and two-bedroom units in four blocks of multi-storey complexes, able to house about four thousand people. It is to have a clubhouse, pool, gyms, accessibility parks, and nature trails, among other features.
The site identified is the gently sloping secondary forest land bordered to the west by the Highway, and on the north by the Ocho Rios main road (from Mammee Bay Roundabout). You can further identify the area by using the recently refurbished Mammee Bay waterwheel, at one end, and the Roaring River Great House at the other, as a guide.
One real estate developer told the North Coast Times “This is a dream location. If they have five thousand units, they’ll sell in two months.”
The development is eight minutes from the centre of Ocho Rios, five minutes to the fast-growing, attractive Drax Hall commercial complex, and a few more minutes to St Ann’s Bay. It is at the northern end of the highway, about 50 minutes to Kingston and 80 to Montego Bay.
LUXURY
The planned CHEC development is within walking distance of Dunn’s River Falls and Park, Pearly Beach, Laughing Waters, Sandals Dunn’s River, and Riu Hotel, as well as new planned luxury developments.
Environmentalists and heritage interests are up in arms.
They point out that part of the site is acknowledged as the critical Rio Bueno Watershed Management Unit. It’s crucial to water for Dunn’s River, Roaring River, Bogue, and Mammee Bay., and much of Ocho Rios and surrounding communities, extending into St Mary. The area is the main aquifer for the flows that feed commercial and residential settlements west of Ocho Rios. The watershed also feeds the river which is a part of the sustainable hydroelectricity plant on the property.
The Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) that is to be discussed on Thursday also said several species of endemic fauna and flora are found on the property.
HERITAGE THREAT
Head of the advocacy group Jamaica Beach Birthright Environmental Movement (JaBBEM), Devon Taylor says many places along the highway could be used by the Government-CHEC arrangement without hurting the environment and threatening Jamaica’s heritage. He pointed to several issues of concern that he said JaBBEM will raise at Thursday’s meeting.
Head of the Jamaica Environmental Trust (JET), Dr Theresa Rodriquez told the North Coast Times that she was reading the EIA report with great interest. She said the people needed to attend the planned meeting. “This is an important development,” she said. JET representatives expect to attend the meeting.
The land has been transferred to CHEC by the Government of Jamaica under a deal reached more than ten years ago to complete the North-South Highway (now the Edward Seaga Highway).
This arrangement formed a part of the 50-year, US$700-million concession agreement that Jamaica entered into with CHEC to build the North-South highway.
The Government had agreed to give CHEC 1,200 acres (500 hectares) of lands contiguous to the highway, as partial compensation for the development of the corridor. Changes were later made to the agreement which was originally signed in 2012. Then Finance Minister Audley Shaw announced the completion of the handover of the property to CHEC in 2017.
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Franklin McKnight
