Carrick-on-Suir street to remain closed for Black Friday but it's causing little traffic and trade disruption, council meeting told

Carrick-on-Suir's business community's hopes that construction works on one of the town's main streets will finish in time to allow it re-open for tomorrow's Black Friday shopping day were dashed at a local authority meeting today (Thursday).
Carrick-on-Suir's New Street will remain closed for most of tomorrow (Friday) for construction workers to finish off a new plaza outside the Town Hall, the monthly meeting of Carrick-on-Suir Municipal District councillors was informed.
But the District's Director Pat Slattery stressed that despite the street closure, Carrick-on-Suir's town centre was very much open for business. He said the construction works haven't so far impacted on the amount of people doing business in the town and the traffic diversions are working well.
"The traffic volumes on Main Street are no different to a normal day. All the on-street car parking spaces are full and so are the car parks. People are coming to town and using the alternative routes.
"The town is very busy today and we hope it will be just as busy and there will be no obstructions for people shopping tomorrow. The access routes to the town are the same as ever and we encourage people to come into the town," he added.
New Street closed to traffic on Monday to facilitate the construction of the plaza linking the newly revamped Town Hall with New Street Car Park. The town's business community had appealed for the project to be completed a day ahead of the five day schedule due to the Black Friday sales, which are a major pre-Christmas shopping day.
Carrick-on-Suir SF councillor David Dunne expressed disappointment that New St. won't be ready to re-open for Black Friday and recounted reading on the internet that an underground tunnel was built in Holland in just 48 hours.
"I am not expecting miracles like that but I thought we could get it done in four days and at least get it done for Black Friday. It's one of the busiest trading days and businesses are struggling," he declared.
However, Cllr Dunne did welcome the project being carried out on New Street and hoped it will in time be appreciated by everyone in the town.
District Engineer Willie Corby explained the construction works will continue into Friday to get the best possible finish on the plaza. Concrete needed time to dry. They couldn't just throw it down.
He pointed out that temperatures were too cold at this time of the year for work with concrete and asphalt to continue at night time.
He also explained that the nature of the work involved was slow and some of it involved the use of small tools.
Mr Corby agreed with Mr Slattery that the traffic diversions were working well and the message about the alternative route had got out to truck drivers. He stressed he had been around the town personally working to ensure traffic kept moving.
Cllr Dunne welcomed Mr Corby's explanation of why it was not possible to finish the plaza in four days and acknowledged the comparison he made with the project in Holland was "lazy".
Fellow Carrick-on-Suir Cllr Kieran Bourke, meanwhile, praised the "excellent" work on the plaza and said he was delighted to see extra funding for improvements to New Street's footpaths.