Government officials are working on a compromise plan that will allow the Cayman Islands National Trust to preserve a section of rare forest in central George Town.
The compromise would allow for a road to be extended through the forest and for private property owners in the area to keep most of their land.
Works and Infrastructure Minister Arden McLean said Thursday the government wishes to purchase approximately six acres of east of the UCCI campus to add to the 10 acres of Crown land which is located directly behind the university.
Mr. McLean said that entire area would be registered to the National Trust, which would maintain it as national park land. Under the plan the current private land owner, Andrew MacGregor Yates, would be able to keep all of his family’s property north of the proposed extension of the Linford Pierson Highway through the forest.
Mr. Yates has previously said he did not wish to sell any of his remaining property in the forest once the road extension is complete.
According to Minister McLean, the government has no desire to use its compulsory acquisition powers to seize the land from Mr. Yates or any of the other private property owners in the area.
‘That is a mean law,’ Mr. McLean said. ‘If the country wants to preserve the entire (undeveloped area of the forest), they need to instruct or direct us to do that. But then we’re going to get the complaints that it’s the big stick.
‘Hopefully, we will have some easing of hearts by some of the private owners and we will be able to purchase some of their property without going to the compulsory acquisition position.’
Mr. Yates has said more than four acres of his family’s forest land was already taken to build the road, which will enter the forest northwest of the Agape Family Worship Centre, cut through the centre of the woods and end at Walkers Road. He said he has not yet been compensated for the land.
He does not oppose the construction of the road, but said he’s upset at the general disregard government has shown in how it has treated the property. Mr. Yates claims people have been allowed to trespass there, and that work crews have caused damage to areas not designated for the road.
Local environmentalists are set against the road’s construction entirely, stating it will eat up a substantial portion of George Town’s only remaining ironwood forest. Department of Environment crews have removed many of the indigenous plants from the area to save them from destruction.
Leader of Government Business Kurt Tibbetts said earlier this month that there appeared to be little or no option to building the new road through the forest. He said other choices examined by government were simply not cost effective.
Mr. McLean said Thursday that he was not ‘hell-bent’ on building the road. However, he said drivers needed to recognise the consequences if it is not built.
‘If the road doesn’t go there, it’s going to take a long time for us to find a route that will satisfy the traffic woes that we are going to experience within the next couple of weeks,’ he said. ‘That is when that phase of the East-West Arterial (road) is going to be finished, and you are going to have all that traffic coming into town at one time.’
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