(CNS): Planning Minister Jay Ebanks, who is responsible for roads, has said that new development along the controversial East-West Arterial Road expansion is inevitable and the government will need to rezone the adjacent parcels so it can control the type of development that happens there. While claiming that the road project will only impact 1% of what he said was the 8,500 acres of Central Mangrove Wetlands, he made it clear during a radio appearance that it would pave the way for much more destruction of that habitat.

Ebanks justified what he accepted could be “an open market for development” on the basis that there is already a lot of development going on around the area “right now” and it was the only place where land was available, and that development would continue to happen “whether the road goes in or not”.

As a guest on For the Record, Radio Cayman’s talk show, on Friday, Ebanks confirmed his full commitment to building the road and said he wanted the scientists to get the environmental impact assessment done as quickly as possible.

Despite the claims by the government that the road will reduce congestion, the minister said people should not look at it as solving the traffic problems but that it was “a second alternative” or an “extra option” to move from A to B when there is a collision or natural disaster and in general to give commuters an extra hour in bed.

Dismissing concerns about the destruction of critical mangrove habitat and flooding of residential areas, Ebanks said he had received information last week that the road would only take up 1% of the land and only 49% of that was actually mangroves. The minister also claimed that research and clearing had already been done along the route, as he urged people to get on board with the project.

However, just a few moments later he confirmed concerns that the untouched habitat in the CMW would become an open market for the developers, which would multiply the destruction, and said he had spoken with the premier about the need to zone the land along the proposed route.

“What we need to do… is start to re-zone the properties along that route where the highway is going so we can control the type of development that will happen along that particular road,” Ebanks said. “We hear… the arguments and the people’s cries about the cost of land and the land shortage… to build on. This is something we really need to do, how we can start to re-zone certain properties.”

Ebanks said it would have been better if the government had been able to buy up the land and control a green corridor. But he said officials could not stop people who wanted to develop their private land alongside the road. “There is going to be development happening no matter what happens,” he stated.

The minister confirmed that the National Roads Authority is working to resolve the bottleneck at Grand Harbour which is a major cause of the congestion, compounding the sheer weight of traffic now on Grand Cayman.