While there is always talk about the perpetual move to Belmopan because of the safety it offers to the population of Belize City in times of natural disasters, the idea of Belize City as the center of the country's commerce and population concentration is too powerful to really abandon. And this morning it was cemented as the Belize City Council launched its metro vision for the old capital.This new vision that those at city hall have seen includes all manner of infra-structural upgradesand additions to the city. Everything from new beaches to parking towers has been fitted in the Council's 8-year plan. Mayor David Fonseca today shared with us his vision for the city in 2010.
Mayor David Fonseca
The Council has put together its vision for the city for the next eight years, leading up to 2010, covering various areas in creating more jobs, tourism and industry, and today's idea is to launch it out, bring it out, bring out the concept to the various agencies and individuals within the city to get a feedback as to how they see it, to get recommendations and probably change around a couple things depending on what they are saying. So, it's basically a day for us to work out the nitty-gritty of the way forward through this vision, the metro-vision. The idea is to look at what is happening in Belize City as we know it presently and two of the major concerns that we see from the city level and we think other people also see it, is the matter of crime within Belize City and also the matter of jobs. We believe it can happen through tourism and creating more industry within, industry and commerce within the city and this is what we intend to do to enhance the inner city, as I refer to it and as we know it right now, and also to launch out on the greater Belize City concept, in order for us to relieve ourselves of the congestions that we are faced with in the city as we know it today.
Alfonso Noble
In terns of infrastructure, I know the issue of traffic in the city has been knocked about for many years and the problem only seems to escalate and a solution has not come. I saw earlier in the back there, you all have a diagram of a four-story structure. Is this something really, that can happen in Belize City?
David Fonseca
Well, it got to work. We've been working on this plan for about two and a half years now. We've brought it to this point where we have finally decided that this is what we need to do. This structure will hold, or should hold roughly two hundred and eighty five vehicles more or less and it should have some elements of commercial activity in the lower, on the ground floor to utilize the entire space that is there. That will relieve the parking situation in the downtown area tremendously.
A large part of the new developments in the city will be concentrated in the Newtown Barracks area of Belize City. Also envisioned in the metro vision is the expansion of Belize City to mile 8 on both Northern and Western highways.