EMERGENCY FUNDING TO HELP with road repairs in West Clare has been sought from the Department of Transport.
Senior engineer with the roads and transportation section of Clare County Council, John Leahy confirmed the local authority has highlighted the condition of roads in West Clare with the Department of Transport. “We will continue to engage with our Department inspector over the coming months to seek additional funding if it becomes available”.
A joint motion from Cllr Cillian Murphy (FF), Cllr Ian Lynch (IND) and Cllr Shane Talty (FF) asked that emergency funding for road repairs be made “given the serious negative impact the winter has had on our regional and local roads in the West Clare Municipal District, the resulting poor condition of many and the scale of the problem”.
Each councillor in the MD is “getting it in the neck every day about the state of our roads, ultimately we’re asked to wallpaper over foundations aren’t good enough,” Cllr Murphy outlined. “We’re not getting to do the proper work first, we’re putting a patcher on roads which aren’t suitable,” he flagged. The Kilkee representative referenced the Moyasta to Doonbeg road and said it is “falling apart, it is a danger for the car and road users, there roads are falling to pieces and we don’t have budget to deal with them”.
Clare’s TDs need to step up and deliver the funding, Cllr Lynch maintained. “Our four TDs need to start doing the work. When it comes to big announcements on houses, they are out before the landlords.. We don’t have the money to manage what we hope to get done this year, I don’t know how we will be able to go back to people and tell them when certain roads are not included”.
Department officials have been presented with a spreadsheet of roads which have been surveyed, senior executive engineer in the West Clare MD, Alan Kenneally stated. “We’re trying to give some scale of the damage cause and we’ve forwarded it to the roads who gave to the Department who have yet to say yay or nay”.
Cathaoirleach of the West Clare MD, Cllr Talty said he raised the point directly with Junior Minister at the Department of Transport, Jack Chambers (FF). “The local authority for the last 100 years or whatever, the function as far as the public is considered is to provide and maintain the public road network”.
At this juncture, Cllr Bill Chambers (FF) suggested the county’s four TDs be brought before a special meeting of the MD. “The LIS scheme is there for ten years, only one or two of them roads have been done”.
Senior executive officer, Siobhán McNulty explained that the schedule of Municipal District works aims to do ten percent of the road network each year. “Increased costs this year mean we are unlikely to get ten percent of the network done. If you did the ten percent, the roads would be covered over ten years”.
Only 6.7 percent of the road network was completed last year, Cllr Lynch flagged. He queried, “if we get the same funding will we only cover four percent” to which McNulty responded, “the ten percent model is one we know we can achieve”.
