St. Maarten Private Eye

The little Dawn beach pond was a pond.
Just as Red Pond is a Pond.
Ponds serve as catchments for rain water coming down the hills.
The Dawn beach pond had mangroves and served it's purpose very well.
I have no idea what Dawn Beach Queen is referring as an irrigation pond.
Sounds like a new term to defend the very bad mistake that Roy made to allow the developers to remove the pond and come up with another bad mistake to build a culvert.
People, please go to Dawn Beach for yourself, and see where this culvert is coming out right into the beach with no filtration system. Worse yet, the beach can always experience high tides from the Atlantic Ocean and the sea will enter the culvert from the beach side. I do hope Roy Marlin will go down as one of the worst environmental offenders along with Westin Columbia Sussex.
Remember, the first planning permit said that the pond has to stay and not be altered, the second planning permit said that the pond could be "moved" altered and whatever else.
Westin Columbia Sussex a la William Young completely removed a natural pond, they hired the local gangsta's to do this, the Toochie Meyers gang helped along by a well known arsenist who served jail time for burning down our government building.
You know people,....... when the Nazi's took control of european countries, they did so with people just like Toochie and Willie, people that did not care about people going to the gas chambers, their only care in the world is their pocket.

Don't be such an ass by accusing me of being in cahoots with the likes of Roy Marlin or any of the other schiesters dealing with the Westin project. I just as soon fuck a snake .

By me saying that it was an irrigation pond , wasn't meant by any means to diminish that fact that it is a pond and it shouldn't be touched. It looks like they have built a retaining ditch, catch basin, pond or whateverthefuck you want to call it between the Westin trailer and Princess Heights.

I hope they get so flooded in the rooms there that they have to spend 4 million extra to re-engineer the entire project. Serves them right . So , now you know what side of the square I'm on , Any questions ?

DBQueen

I have video of that area as the Westin had broken ground (mid/lt2005)and the land is completely cleared and pylons are in and that culvert you have pictured was already there . It was overgrown with brush but you can clearly see it in my video . It empties out unto the beach area toward the OysterPond side , not the Dawn Beach Estates side . I viewed the video to refresh my memory and it has good shots of the area , there are other things on the video such as RedPond , Guana Bay and Gibbs Bay . Shows all the wonder vegatation and shoreline. There is no contestation that Red Pond is a pond in this video. The video has a glint at the irrigation "pond" on Dawn Beach. As I said it was more for myself than anything but it happened to capture the progression of the Westin without even really trying .

DBQueen

As these pictures show it being built by Babitbay/Westin. The only thing there was a small wall and a fence, all the way along to scavengers. All water used to drain into the ponds.

AS you can see the concern of residents along this side of the property, the wall of the culvert would leave a hole on their side which would fill with water. I guess Westin wanted to give them their own pond.

I have lots moe photos if needed. Perhaps you could cut a small clip from your video and post it on YouTube to show us what you see.

Local Hero

You wrote : "but what I want to bring to your attention in them is the drainage culvert which was shown under construction in this post."

I misunderstood you . I thought you were posting this picture as a "brand new " picture "the culvert which was shown under construction". I was trying to point out that it was in one of my videos from August 2005 and that if you thought the culvert was just constructed , it was not . Sorry, for any misunderstanding .

I will see if I can do the Youtube thing . I'm not that computer literate , but will try it .

DBQueen

Silly DB Queen, I think you did misunderstand and I think LH was thinking that you were saying the culvert had always been there since Scavenger days.

Are you related to DB Princess? :)

I don't think LH was suggesting the Culvert was a new thing, it was one of the first things Suxsit did there while they started ripping down the hillside and raising the valley floor bv over 2 meters. The culvert got covered up after. I think he was pointing out what a ridiculous situation to have.

The so called hole in the ground that Suxsit built at the bottom of the road coming down the hill on the right is ridiculously small and does not serve the function that a proper retention pond would or should.

I wonder which insurance company is going to offer insurance for this place and what the premiums are likely to be considering it could be flattened any year. And what about Flash Flooding? What if someone, a tourist for example, or their child, gets killed in one. Would members of Suxsit then be liable for Jail Time? It's not like everyone involved with the project haven't been warned now is it.

Time will tell......

To anon above,
Thanks for bringing up the topic of insurance.
I have thought of the same, who and which company in their right mind will be insuring this WESTIN and CORAL SHORE development?
These people WILL experience a hurricane and then they will see what a terrible job they have done.
Of course the people of SXM will again be staring at empty buildings a-la- Mullet Bay, so then the population should hold R. Marlin responsible, even if he is not in government anymore.

Once you let one beach become semi private and with restricted acccess, others will follow. It's not just us locals who are going to have trouble finding somewhere to go with our children, but our tourists too. It will be more a case of you can only really use this beach if you are staying at our hotel, or if you can find somewhere to park.

I agree with your opinion that these people don't want low life locals crowding their high paying guests 'Beach of theri own' and I think the beach party is a great idea, just every damn week.

The distance from the waterline detailed in the permits has been mentioned several times in the press. 50M and 33m.

About Jobs, Roy once claimed 600 jobs would be created, then it was 400 and now it's 300. Yet, when Westin started interviews it turns out to be 180. Does the guy ever stop talking what those red trucks pump?

And yesterday there was this article which I intend to write about tonight. The man thinks it takes too long to get permits approved because it's too easy for people to lodge an objection. He wants to shorten the process so the decisions do not go in front of the Island Council but the ExCo. People with objections will be forced to pay up to go to court, this affect EVERYONE. And it gives far too much power to someone who abuses that which he has already.

This must NOT be allowed to happen, if anything we need stricter and more comprehensive reviews of planning permits, including environmental studies and infrastructre assesments. This decision comes from the Erato's who are pissed that two more objections from the Nature Foundation and SXM Pride were lodged against Aquarius, they were pissed big time. It also comes from Westins plans for the Millenium project and of course Mullet Bay. All these developers are supporters of the DP party.

This is going to be a fight and we are going to hold EVERY opposition member accountable to oppose it. Sadly, all of them except Gracita seems to have fallen into a trap because of their eagerness about permits for one of their friends. All Roy has to say is that they wanted permits to be granted faster.

How depressing.

Flipper

Haven't had time to write about Roy's plans to change permit proceedures yet.

I wonder how many people took notice of it.

I will in the next day or so.

Flipper

We will be closing the Westin road for sewer pipe install next weekend starting from 10/7/06 to 10/9/06.

I hope to have the pipe installed by midday Sunday & went long through Monday to be safe.

But I'm sure my trencher will do the job.

We contacted Public Works & they informed Babitbay that no notice was required in the papers, so I'm trying to get the word out now.

Respectfully, Dale D. Zager

Dale,
There is no Westin Road that exists on St. Maarten and probably not anywhere else for that matter. The name of the roads that connect are the Oyster Pond Road and Melford Hazel Road.
This may seem minor to you but I'm sure the family of Melfod Hazel would take extreme offense to arbitrarily renaming a road that honors a national Hero.

Dear Anon,
I appreciate your concern on the name's of the road's in the Tamrind Hill ,Dawn Bch. area.
When I wrote my email 1 week ago to a local friend & neighbor I did not expect it to end up on SXM PI, or I would have been more politically & locally correct.
As I do take things personal, I have researched all of my local maps & internet site's for Melford Hazel Road.
My local maps all indicate the road as Oyster Pond Road from Hulda B. Richardson Rd. & connecting back to Suckergarden Rd.
Only after searching the web was I able to find mention of the road when I stumbled across Century21 website listing their Dawn Bch. office on MH Rd.
If you got a glance at my poorly constructed "Road Closed at the Westin" signs , which I had placed , I think you would have recognized that it was never my intention to call it the Westin Rd.
I was able to get the sewer line installed & the road opened by 8 PM Sat. evening.
The road conditions are still poor but will be redone in the next few month's.
As for other roads with the Westin name, one is located on the island of Kauai , Hawaii and one in Madison, Wisconsin.
Respectfully, Dale D. Zager
Zager Plumbing NV

Dale,

I too did not understand which WESTIN road you are reffering to, if it is WESTIN narrow passage way to the beach on WESTIN property, then there is indeed no reason to make a NOTICE.
But if it is the road coming from the Tamarinde Hill and Dawn Beach Estates, then you have to advertise that the road would be closed.
These people at Public Works have proven on more than one occassion that they are a bunch of fools and I hope to god one day they will be held liable for their incompetency and stupidity, one has to wonder if they told you this as another go-ahead from Roy Marlin to appease you developers.
I agree with the author above, that foreign developers have to have respect for the local culture, local heroes and local norms, you are guests here, we are your hosts, it is just makes us cringe that our politicans are in your pocket and they conveniently forget who voted them in, they forget the local people for their own money making and million dollar houses on a hill in Oyster Pond/Dawn Beach.

Westin are doin a heckofa job winning hearts and minds.

Westin damages TelEm cable - 10th October 2006

TelEm cables damaged by 'West Inn' - 10th October 2006

Did anyone see the Profiles Episode? I will try to get Dwight to let us have the whole thing. I guess the next step is to start asking VROM, ROB and Kadaster if they have been over there yet. The local papers don't want to touch it, weasels that they are.

LH