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Transportation on Saint
Helena
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St. Helena. Pictures taken by Richard
Despite what literature
you may read, St. Helena DOES have a regularly
scheduled air service, at roughly 3pm every Sunday.
Obviously, however, with no airport on the Island,
South African airways flight 223 from Sao Paolo to
Johannesburg passes several thousands of feet over
the island and is thus of no real use to islanders
except as a weekly source of a strange sound which
until you have worked out (or been told) what it is,
serves to confuse you.
I have no idea if Henry Ford's descendants have ever
heard of St. Helena, but to my mind they could do
much worse than advertise St. Helena as an ad-hoc
ford museum. There are a surprising number of cars
on St. Helena, the majority imported from the UK
with some from South Africa. Whilst there is a
surprisingly large variety of makes and models, by
far the largest proportion are Fords, and all known
hire cars, seem to be Ford as well. Being so
isolated, logically it does make sense for certain
makes/models to proliferate, as it means that spare
parts can be kept in stock and the garages know how
to maintain them. A one off may be fine, but if it
requires a special part you can then be left with a
wait of 2months+ before it arrives. And due to the
high import charges, vehicles often last for many
years, and so it is not unusual to see fairly old
cars wandering around and this has led to things
like Mark I cortina's and other such classics still
in good condition and regular usage. At the very
least, ford could produce a 'through the ages'
advert here.
There are a
surprising number of roads around the Island, most of which are tarred/sealed
and i reasonably good condition. Indeed, whilst potholes do exists, I
haven't seen any which compare those that you can find reasonably easy
in the average Europe town or countryside. It is also not uncommon to
come across workmen cutting away the vegetation on the verges or filling
small gaps or clearing loose rocks away. Having said that, roads are not
always all that big, and even some of the main roads can look like small
tracks.
Road signs and
village names, do exist in good supply and are all seem so friendly.
Even the names themselves almost all sound welcoming - Levelwood, Half
Tree Hollow, Sandy Bay and Alarm Forest, for example - and there are
none of the terse or dodgy sounding names that tend to appear elsewhere.
Transport on the
island is pretty much cars alone. As previously sadly noted, bikes are
forbidden on many of the Islands roads (especially downhill sections),
in general for their own safety a much a anything else. However there is
a limited bus service, despite the fact that there is no commuting
traffic: The major island and town employers, Thorpe and Soloman and Son
(who between them are involved with or own virtually every enterprise on
the Island), as well as the Government lay on free employee minibuses to
and from work. Buses are at best infrequent on almost all routes, and
are generally aimed at helping those out in the country get into town
for half a day or so. Besides, everybody knows the drivers and can just
call ahead to let them know they are coming...
Apart from that, at this stage at least, public
transport means the RMS St. Helena, the Island's
lifeline. When she arrives, there is excitement, but
when she leaves, just sadness and isolation.
Written by Rich Perkins (Gelli) on
December 21st 2008
Posted on January 13th 2009
More stories of his on
randomtraveller.travellerspoint.com
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