*Cllr Tommy Guilfoyle (SF).
“STOP with the nonsense” and work on the projects that the county town needs was the message issued to the top table of the Ennis Municipal District by Cllr Tommy Guilfoyle (SF).
Explanation and justification for the inclusion of a proposed one-way traffic system on the Mill Rd in Ennis and an elevated boardwalk across the Post Office Field in the draft Ennis Transport Plan was sought by Cllr Guilfoyle.
At behind closed-door briefings he said “repeated and clear opposition” was issued by councillors to the Mill Rd proposal, a stance which has since been shared by businesses and members of the public. Another in-camera meeting saw agreement by elected representatives to place the Post Office Field plans in the Ennis 2040 strategy under review.
Subsequently, he asked that both items be excluded from the final draft of the transport plan.
Senior executive engineer, Eamon O’Dea explained the one way system for Cornmarket St, Mill Rd, Old Mill Rd and Considine Terrace was proposed due to lack of safe pedestrian access along Cornmarket Street, particularly on the section from the Old Western Garages to Pound Lane. The building causing an obstruction to the provision of a new footpath is a protected structure. There is no footpath from the Service Station to this location and pedestrians are required to enter the traffic lane to pass the protected structure”.
Regarding the elevated boardwalk across the Post Office Field linking Woodquay to Bindon St, O’Dea stated, “the proposal was strategically regarded as having Active Travel merit and was therefore included in the draft Ennis LTP. As requested by the members of Ennis MD, the proposed future development of the boardwalk at the Post Office field is to be reviewed and brought back to the members of Ennis MD for further consideration”.
According to Cllr Guilfoyle, the reply from O’Dea “fails to acknowledge the heart of the motion”. He added, “there is no explanation provided as to why the voices of councillors was sidelined or any justification for pressing ahead with proposals which lack public support”. Transparency and accountability needs to be given by the Council as to “why two contentious proposals remain within the draft” because their presence “undermines confidence within the consultation process”. He continued, “this concern is heightened because in previous documents much fought issues still went forward and made the finish line, they went so forward that people had to march against them”.
He praised the initiative of Michael Barry who “is willing to put up protected structure, to say take it down and build it back to allow footpath that be built, we need to grab that opportunity, tell the NTA we will support that and we need a bridge at Drehidnagower not the Post Office Field, let’s work on the projects the town needs, stop with the nonsense”.
Changes to the Mill Rd lack sense, Cllr Tom O’Callaghan (FF) stated. He referred to findings from a study included in the Ennis 2040 strategy published in May 2021 that only two percent of trips in Ennis are from cyclists, “why rip up all of Ennis for two percent of all of Ennis, to me that is bizarre. We have to think about the residents and people living there, I don’t want 6,000 trucks coming past my house”.
Residents and businesses have been worried over the proposed one-way system, Cllr Antoinette Baker Bashua (FF) flagged. “You cannot expect the people of that area to expect big huge articulated lorries going through that area, it is a bottleneck to get from A-B, we’ve cars speeding up the little green area we have in Hermitage. The fact you’d envisage or imagine having big lorries in that area, I understand totally the utopia of the world we’ll be living in we might have flying cars and we might not need car spaces but for now we need to leave it is as it”.
She said solutions have been identified by local businesses which need to be listened to. “I understand the annoyance, money with conditions isn’t proper money, we need to work together, before we have another proposal get with the local business men and people in the community to come up with a proper plan”. Cllr Baker Bashua predicted a boardwalk on the Post Office Field would be closed within months “for health and safety reasons. Go back to the drawing board, see what you can do with funding to make it more accessible. Put the money into developing the post office building and leave the post office field alone”.
Accepting that the transport plan was in its draft stage, Cllr Pat Daly (FF) highlighted, “You can’t make a street out of a residential area which has five businesses included, an adjustment to the plan has to happen”. He said the Council must listen to the voice of the people.
Mayor of the Ennis MD, Cllr Mary Howard (FG) recalled, “The day we saw these in workshops a few months ago, this image was shown to us and not one of us agreed with it, the plan is all about Ennis not the one area, nobody agreed with it and I don’t see it happening, Michael Barry has stepped up and fair play to him”.
