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And one of those pressure points is also the Haulover bridge. It was supposed to open in December, and now it's been reset to mid March.
But that's too late to cash a political dividend - and so, viola, we saw today's soft opening.
Politics aside, it was also a historic day, after the historical Haulover Bridge - built in 1947, was closed off today to make way for its spectacular 1800 foot successor.
Jomarie Lanza was there and here's what she saw.
Belize City traffic flowed out onto the new Haulover bridge just after 11:00 this morning, as vehicles were diverted from one side to the other, so MIDH can begin making the final transfers from the old to the new. Chief Engineer Evondale Moody explains why they opened the bridge earlier, still with a few magic touches left to add.
Evondale Moody, MIDH, Chief Engineer
"So today we're basically doing a soft opening of the new haulover bridge. This is being done in an effort for us to get traffic onto the new structure because of the old alignment."
"We have to tie in to the existing road. And so at that intersection is where we will have a high elevation. And so we need to close off the all approach so that traffic could be transferred to the new bridge."
"Okay. Well, the idea is that we want to have this one substantially completed."
"And so the idea is to have that done by the first or second week in March. Once we could complete all the aspects of the new structure, which includes the additional rails that we have pending and some tie-ins that we have to do for the utility companies, then we would consider the bridge to be 100% complete. Thereafter, we intend to engage the same contractor to do the dismantling of the whole haulover bridge, and so we could transport that to Belmopan and use it somewhere else in the future."
And while the two bridges, side by side, are a testament to how far we have come in terms of infrastructural advancement, Moody says that this brand new beauty was built to withstand anything, and is predicted to last for a solid century:
Evondale Moody, MIDH, Chief Engineer
"Well, this structure is designed to last 100 years. And so with the integrity of the structure, we definitely believe that it will be able to sustain. And in natural disasters, it's also designed to contain basically a Category five hurricane. So that shouldn't be a problem. It's not a steel structure that would be susceptible to wind damages. And so forth.And also the substructure that we have is designed for earthquakes as well. So this should be a structure that should last with maintenance for at least 100 years."
"So we have two sidewalks, if you can see. The sidewalks are outside this barrier. So this biro here on both side is basically for vehicular traffic so that in the event you have any accidents, they would hit the barrier first rather than hitting pedestrians. And so what is happening is the pedestrian safety really on the old side.And so we are continuously working on that. We expect to have those installed within the next four weeks or so because we had some delays with the shipment of materials coming into the country."
The minister told us there is nothing more exciting for him than seeing the country's first Belizean made bridge from design to build.
Julius Espat, Minister of Infrastructure and development.
"It's very exciting. This is the first bridge that was designed by a Belizean, built by a Belizean supervised by Belize, how can you not be proud of a situation like this. And then you all are seeing it. It's an awesome experience to be here."
"Remember originally, this bridge was estimated as close to $60 million. We brought it to nearly half of that to 30 million. All the amenities required and if you will, have a little bit of overlap right now because we are moving away from the old bridge to the new one. And that's why we thought it was important to do the soft opening. There is a lot of work that has to be done to transfer especially the water lines and stuff like that So it's normal in construction that these things occur. But it's not like I heard the news last night, they were saying that when it was due to open last year. But I think a better terminology would be you were supposed to be open last month, last year, but it is what."
