Road standards and quality a serious concern in for councillors in Tipperary

At the second full council meeting of the new term, one issue that was unanimously shared throughout the council was that of road quality and road standards in the county.

The first road-related issue to be brought up was that of speeding in estates, something that many councillors agreed was a key concern for locals whilst they were out canvassing in the lead up to this year’s local elections.

Cllr David Dunne from Carrick-on-Suir was one of the first to speak up, he said: “Speed needs to be brought down in estates, it’s a serious accident waiting to happen.

“We’ve talked about it many times before but it was one of the key issues that I was met with when out canvassing earlier in the year and I know many of my fellow councillors had the same experience in their own areas.

“One of things that needs to be seriously considered is speed ramps in housing estates.

“It’s only a matter of time before a child is seriously hurt or worse.”

Cllr Phyll Bugler joined him in his sentiment, saying, “Ramps to curb speed need to be put in place, they do it in other counties so I don’t understand why we can’t implement it here. It’s a serious matter of safety.”

Cllr Andy Moloney was next to address the issue of road safety and brought up hedge trimming and sight lines on roads:

“The recent significant growth of hedges is a serious danger to road users.

“I think there’s a situation of crossed wires where the County Council are saying it’s the responsibility of landowners to trim hedges but in actual fact many of the hedges that need trimming are owned by the County Council and responsibility isn’t being claimed by either party.

“Something needs to be done because we are seeing dangerous levels of growth and the hedge cutting is not being managed effectively so many of our roads are becoming seriously hazardous.”

Cllr Maírín McGrath raised a further issue causing confusion when it comes to ownership of trimming duties: “There is a significant amount of money being wasted when it comes to trimming around road signage. TII (Transport Infrastructure Ireland) only trim around their signs and leave the rest of the area to be cut by council, creating two jobs that cost money when this could all be done by one party.

“There must be something we can do to partner with TII so that we can stop wasting money that could be spent in countless other areas.”

It wasn’t necessarily all negativity when it came to roads. Cllr Bugler also made sure to mention the progress being made on the new Birdhill to Ballina road, “The road is really starting to shape up and is going to be a great asset to the area.

“One thing I would ask is that we create a snag list for the final stretch so that we can make sure we finish this thing off on time.

“It feels a bit like the Clare side is making faster progress at times so I want to make sure that we aren’t left to trail behind in Tipperary.”