The Editor, Sir:

It has never failed to amaze how disjointed the vision and focus of our leaders can be. The latest example is the rather short-sighted and myopic decision to demolish the historic fountain at Sam Sharpe Square in Montego Bay to accommodate traffic.

It seems to have escaped the attention of the Mayor, the Parish Council, and the National Works Agency (NWA) that Montego Bay is supposedly a tourist city. I have not read the tourism master plan but I'm going to assume that, like many of the wonderful tourist cities of the world, it contemplates Montego Bay evolving into a walkthrough city. How else do we expect the many thousands of visitors we are courting to mingle and participate in the commercial and cultural life of its host city, given the limited island space we have?

Traffic plan needed

What is needed from the NWA, Mayor, Parish Councils and tourist interest is a traffic plan that sensibly, and with sensitivity, limits vehicular traffic in sections of the city centre. We can then encourage outdoor cafés, eateries, craft and cultural events to flourish, free from blaring horns, greenhouse gas belching from tailpipes and drivers cursing at any and everything including our visitors, which gets in their way.

Our leaders need to start explaining to our people that the goose we wish to lay the golden egg needs a certain environment to be comfortable. As full-time hosts, that will require some adjustments in our home (town and cities).

So, Minister Bartlett, I humbly urge you to halt the madness. Get your tourism team to devise a plan to get the Sam Sharpe fountain operational again, refurbish and landscape the area, add some light, station tourist wardens to deter the undesirable, mount a plaque telling the story of the square and make it the centrepiece of Montego Bay. For the future, the "corridor of elegance" should lead to Sam Sharpe Square. In plain language, tell the NWA, "bad idea, faget it!"

I am, etc.,

SEAN WALKER

loveJAbad@gmail.com