Canine Demise

There is no more Dogwagon.

It left me with a loud tick, then silence, then an uncomfortable rattling from that little thingy that controls the heat of the glow plug, then a few well placed epithets, then nothing but the fading echo of the door slamming shut.

No great matter, though, as I had a spare. The spare is a newer version of the same Mitsubishi, with a few less miles, and with a much more powerful (i.e. turbocharged) diesel engine. It does move a bit better, so calling the thing Dogwagon II is probably out of the question. As of this moment, it remains unchristened,... Truckulator?... Mitsutrashheap?... Give me a second,...

Mangycurmobile?

Magadogomatic? Hmm. Promising.

Which reminds me, the other evening, while fjording White Gut to avoid the citizen road block of the existing highway in front of Sonya’s Highway Pub, the driver of a minibus squeezing down the mud track in the opposite direction leaned even further out of his window to exclaim in my general direction, and for no obvious cause, “Mister White Boy!”
Yeah, that be MISTER White Boy, mon.

Actually, I was seriously considering not accepting the other truck, when it was delivered to me earlier in the week. Despite the greater power, lower miles, higher clearance, three cup holders, two speaker cassette stereo and power on two of the four windows, it is bright red. Bright, shiny red, with large chrome tubes for running boards, chrome tubular brush bar and a matching chrome roll bar. This van stands out,... sticks out,... like a tourist on Jamaica. If fact, the red is the same shade as many tourists, and just as painful to the eye.

Some may note that my last car was bright red. To them I say, “nyah, nyah, nyah”. To the rest of you, I will note that, in a land primarily populated by stark white vehicles, I would rather not be the subject of any excess attentions. As it turns out, the Dogwagon made the choice for me. That, and the sizable increase in power apparent with the new one.

Of course, we will not put down the ol’ Dogwagon. We will fix it, but it will not be returned to me. Instead, I will assign it to one of my inspectors as a field vehicle. He can rename it.

Our field guys’ inspection fleet used to consist of three or four ratty old Toyota pickups. Four doors, for sure, but each with around 300,000 klicks on the clock. Their time had long expired prior to them being assigned to us. Few working lights, fewer working window winders, convenient snap off bumpers, springs sticking up through the seats or down through the holes in the floors,... the works. Think back. Remember the worst car you ever owned? Luxury. Remember the worst car you have ever seen? Good for you.

The Ministry recently replaced these awful vans with a couple of four year old Suzuki’s and a newer Toyota. They ain’t real pretty, but they help me forget the massive repair bills I had to process to keep the old green relics on the road.

Yet, even greater than the fleet repair costs are the mileage checks we write to those inspectors who drive their own vehicles for work. Sure, the bad roads are bound to do more damage to a vehicle than smooth ones, but is it worth twenty five Jamaican Dollars (US $0.55) a mile? And, with the physical length of the project as it is, I see some really large mileage checks.

Each fortnight, the largest of these checks invariably goes to one man, who inspects the eastern end of the job. According to the submitted vehicle log, he claims to drive almost 200 kilometers each day, so, at the end of the fortnight, he gets a check for roughly JA $40k. Over the course of a year, this equates to about US $23k. It is all too obvious that this figure is excessive, and most likely a complete work of fiction.

So this inspector will get the Dogwagon, once it gets back from the vet. This will cramp his lifestyle, to be sure, but I am just an evil puke some days, especially when trying to save the Client a buck or two.

But the Client’s pocketbook is just one of his current worries. Time is of the essence as well. The Minister of Transport and Works, the Honorable Doctor Peter Phillips, still holds firm to his promise that the highway will be completed by the year end. Go ahead. Laugh all you want. It really is his promise, though, and apparently his actual intention to get the project at least substantially complete. He is probably delusional.

So... Wednesday I receive a facsimile from the Ministry that my attendance is required at a meeting to be chaired by the Ministry’s Chief Technical Dude on Thursday.

At last”, I thought, “an opportunity to discuss with da man hisself, one on one, our spate of problems and some potential solutions.” Only later did I learn that the meeting would be well attended - all of the subcontractors, The Contractor, the water utility, and assorted Ministry minions. There would be no one on one discussion of the project and potential solutions. Sadly, only after the meeting was over was it clear that the Chief Dude would not even be making an appearance as chairman, two and a half hours being excessively late, even for a Jamaican.

Except for the lack of pom pons, the meeting felt like a pep rally where only the cheerleaders are peppy (reminiscent of the “Pimples Full of Pus” event the fall of 1977, except without J. Bob Walther). The Ministry was trying to sell to the team their plan to complete the Works by their newer, closer, more arbitrary date of some eleven short weeks from now. They would now be enablers, and would do “whatever it takes” to stay the course.

The contractors just wanted to know when the utilities would be relocated, and when they would get paid, as most of their deferred financing was used up performing previously “whatever it takes” tasks. The utility relocations are almost a lost cause, as that money has yet to be found.

In May, the Client asked that we prepare a completion cost estimate, which we did, which he sat on for three months, until he asked us to prepare an updated completion cost estimate, which we did, which he sat on until now. Fearing for his job, the Project Director (recently back from the dead) has delayed presenting Cabinet and the government finance guys with the estimated cost of this debacle. Without this presentation, funding cannot increase beyond existing limits, and the project will stall. I would have no problem doing this, mostly as I would like to see the faces of this group when they hear that their little highway, which The Contractor was to build for US $25M, is now estimated to cost much much more.

As for me, a hundred megabuck highway is a much more impressive project to place on my resume. Read More......