MASQUERADERS ARE IN for more time on the road this Kadooment Day.
The Monday, August 4 jump-up will return to the National Stadium as the starting point, and instead of turning onto Brighton, bands will continue to the Frank Worrell Roundabout and down the Spring Garden Highway to the Holborn junction.
Chief executive officer of the National Cultural Foundation (NCF), Cranston Browne, said the extended route came at the request of bandleaders.
“It is something that the bandleaders had been asking for for a very long time. In fact, from the time I was doing bands in the ’90s we were asking for it. It is something that we finally thought should happen and it is a better route altogether.”
He was speaking to the SATURDAY SUN at the Crop Over In The City event held in Independence Square on Thursday evening.
“We met with the Barbados Association of Masqueraders (BAM) and they brought [the idea] to us and we accepted it.”
BAM president Chetwin Stewart said that outside of having a longer route for the festivities, there would also be additional space to accommodate revellers, vendors and spectators. He also believed that more vantage points would make those on the road feel safer.