Bumpy road ahead for councillors in local elections

SHOCK €220M bill to fix roads

Councillors are gearing up for an earful on doorsteps around the county as they take to bumpy roads on the campaign trail ahead of the local elections.

Elected representatives were left stunned when told it could take another €220 million, the same figure spent over the past five years, in order to fix all local roads and bring all of them up to what might be considered an “acceptable standard”.

The “back of an envelope calculation” was shared by Director of Services Paddy Connaughton with councillors at their April monthly meeting, which earlier heard that €221 million had been spent repairing surfaces in the county since 2018.That figure included €86 million awarded to Cavan County Council from Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII), €100 million from the Department of Transport, €13 million from the National Transport Authority, close to €15 million from the local authority's own coffers, and various other smaller funding allowances. “€221 million is a sizeable amount for a small county,” remarked Mr Connaughton of the expenditure on roads, 95% of which are classed as either local or regional.

The debate on road conditions throughout Cavan surfaced on foot of a motion tabled by Aontú's Sarah O'Reilly, who said recent weather conditions, including “incessant heavy rainfall”, coupled with “criminal underfunding”, has had a “brutal effect” on the local road network.

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“The culmination of 16 years of underfunding since 2008 from central government for our regional and local road network - absorbing a €95 million shortfall in that time – has finally caught up with us. What else would you expect?”

With no alternatives the Bailieborough elected rep said the people of Cavan, including industry, have a “higher level of dependence” on the local road network than other counties.

“This results in a continuous high-volume flow of heavy goods vehicles on structurally weak local roads with poor soils and drainage. I live in Bailieborough located in the Bailieborough-Cootehill municipal district. In my area we have a very serious deterioration in the regional and local road networks especially in the Cootehill, Bailieborough, Kingscourt and Shercock areas. The grant aid from the Department of Transport has increased since the harsh cutbacks in roads funding in the period 2008-2016, but the rate of increase is too slow. There is, it seems, money for everything else.”

“We will never restore the conditions of our road network to the standards of pre-2008 at this rate,” she said, highlighting also the impact of inflation on materials and labour.

“It is estimated that to bring our local and regional roads network up to a PSCI rating of 10-9 would require funding in excess of €210m. This year’s allocation of 18.14m, even though half a million below our 2008 allocation, was welcomed with cheery delight by some local TDs in The Anglo-Celt dated February 16, 2023. It just goes to show you what they know about issues facing our county and how hard they are fighting for the resources. They should have welcomed the allocation and demanded more.”

Cllr O’Reilly said that five roads in her own area have been left off the road works programme for 2024, with one road added and other projects curtailed due to financial constraints.

“I have one road in particular that doesn’t even have tarmac on it. Locals are driving on shale, and this road has been left off the works programme,” she claimed, adding that ministers and TDs are in “the Dáil bubble” and “very far removed from the people”.

She referenced the Minister for Transport, Eamonn Ryan’s recent visit to Cavan.

“He showed absolutely no interested,” she claimed of attempts by local councillors to highlight the plight of their respective communities. “There seems to be money for just about everything else. You name it! Libraries, football pitches, museums. We will have these huge big beautiful shiny monuments and no roads to get to them!

“People have not been beating down my door for new greenways, hate speech, abortion, or deposit return schemes. They have been looking for what you would imagine is a given. Simple things that go without saying - a home, health services, and a road to get to their job without losing the wheel of their car. I am thinking of a particular case in Laragh, where two wheels of a car were busted at the same time in one pothole leaving the driver totally stranded.”

Mr Connaughton confirmed that the budget for fixing potholes had also reduced by €50,000.

Fine Gael’s TP O’Reilly said it was the “same problem” in areas throughout the county. He supported the motion though, admitting the council “needs extra funding”.

“It’s only a sticking plaster at the moment.”

There were roads, he said, not on the list, that in three years time will be in a “desperate state” unless something is done. Fianna Fáil’s Aiden Fitzpatrick jested he “can’t even get a sticking plaster for our own roads”.

Still, the money spent to date, and the funding awarded for this year, had to be looked at in a positive light.

Up to €1 million will be spent fixing Station Lane in Cootehill, he pointed out, conceding that overall: “We do need a lot more money”.

Cllr Áine Smith challenged Cllr O’Reilly over her comments TDs live in a Dáil bubble, saying that her uncle, Deputy Brendan Smith, had raised the issue of Cavan roads with government as recently as March 21.

Independent Ireland rep Shane P. O’Reilly reminded it has been Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil in government.

He asked that the council write to the department to ask that end of year allocations be delivered earlier to allow local authorities spend it better.

An ‘embarrassment’

Val Smith (FG) said every area had endured cuts to road funding. He fumed at works being carried out on roads where few people lived compared to other roads with greater volumes of traffic that had been overlooked.

“It’s an embarrassment,” he said campaigning for votes in area with roads in poor condition and no prospect of a fix in the near future. “It’s a disgrace.”

Others to contribute to the debate included Fianna Fáil’s Clifford Kelly, Patricia Walsh, and John Paul Feeley, as well as Independent Brendan Fay and Fine Gael’s Peter McVitty, who called for the reintroduction of a specially convened roads meeting within the council as done previously.

In response to the comments, and those of Mr Connaughton, Cllr O’Reilly (Aon) said people were increasingly “fed up”, and that the issue needed to remain on the agenda.