Palmetto Road will likely reopen to two-way traffic in June — 16 months after a wall collapse which forced the closure of the westbound lane.

Public Works Minister Trevor Moniz told the House of Assembly that the project is set to go to tender in January 2014, with work anticipated to start in February.

He said that while the Ministry is carrying out the design and construction work on the project, it intends to later claim costs back from the owners of the property.

“I would like to thank the public for their patients over the last six months since the traffic lights have been in place, which may have caused some minor traffic delays,” he said.

“However I would rather have a few delays in traffic than to make an apology for any tragedies that could occur if I did not take proactive steps to have one lane operation.”

On February 28, the Ministry was notified of a significant rock face collapse on a Perimeter Lane property adjacent to Palmetto Road. Highway engineers expressed concern about the stability of the exposed rock face, particularly due to its proximity to the westbound lane of the Palmetto Road.

Mr Moniz said that the owners of the Perimeter Lane property had started work on a retaining wall in 2010, but work was abandoned due to financial and design challenges.

The Ministry carried out an independent check of the propose wall and determined that it was substandard and needed to be redesigned.

“Officials within the Ministry met with one of the landowners to determine where the construction process was, since the traffic lights could not stay up indefinitely.

“The Ministry subsequently issued a statutory nuisance notice to the landowners in May of this year requesting that they submit a design acceptable to the Ministry, along with timelines for construction.

“The landowners failed to respond and as a result it was determined that to progress the reopening of Palmetto Road to the public it would be better for the Ministry to carry out the design and construction works, then claim costs back from the landowner.”