€50m bill to fix all Bboro-Cootehill roads

The district accounts for more than one-third of the county's overall road structure (37%/ 1,107km), compared to Cavan Belturbet (30%/ 921km) and Ballyjamesduff (33%/ 983km).

It could cost in the region of €50 million to fix all roads located within the Bailieborough-Cootehill Municipal District area alone.

Even then, further sustained funding would be required by the council to carry out maintenance and upgrades.

The district accounts for more than one-third of the county's overall road structure (37%/ 1,107km), compared to Cavan Belturbet (30%/ 921km) and Ballyjamesduff (33%/ 983km).

It is the largest network by far, and has a population of 24,500, the majority of who live in rural areas.

The details were laid out by Senior Area Engineer Alan Lyons as part of a presentation to the members elected to the Bailieborough-Cootehill Municipal District area last Monday (July 13).

It was delivered on foot of a request tabled by Fianna Fáil's Clifford Kelly at a previous meeting.

Mr Lyons outlined how the vast majority of the 1,107km of roadway within the district is made up of Local Primary (297km) Secondary (514km) routing, with the remainder being National Primary (141km); Regional (158km); and finally Local Tertiary (124km).

The near insurmountable challenge facing the county's roads department was also laid bare by Mr Lyons. He pulled no punches when making clear how far the council had fallen in terms of funding from its height before the crash of the Celtic Tiger in 2009, leading to a near €60m cumulative shortfall in funding for the county.

He informed the meeting that roads locally were graded in two ways - by machine for quality/structure/ bumpiness and also skid resistance, and also by visual analysis.

The machine checks were done every six to seven years, while council staff carried out visual examinations every five years, feeding their observations every two kilometres back into centralised system that was also accessible by the department, and helped map where investment was needed.

Ranked

Road condition was ranked from one to ten, with ten being “perfect” and one being “virtually undrivable”, Mr Lyons explained.

“The dream would be to have all roads at 10,” said Mr Lyons, but the reality was that most were ranked between five to eight.

Those in worse condition were “sporadic” and “spread out” said Mr Lyons, or on roads where generally there was no public access anyway.

He said too that constant management was important because it could so easily happen that a “four becomes a three, or five becomes a four” following deterioration.

Around 16.7% of the county's roads could be regarded, according to the Department's own set of standards, as “poor condition”. By comparison, 30% of roads in Co Offally were assessed as such, almost 30% in Donegal, 11% in Monaghan, and 14% in Meath. “We're not the worst, but we're not the best,” he observed.

“The next question is what will happen next year with Covid-19,” Mr Lyons put to the meeting.

Bridges too required attention, with fixes costing anywhere between €35,000 and €200,000.

The lack of alternative transport for the region, such as rail, and the concentration of heavy good vehicles and industry also, placed added pressure on local roads.

“It's the HGVs that tend to do the damage,” noted Mr Lyons, before stating that it would take in the region of €50m just to fix all of the roads in the Bailieborough-Cootehill Municipal District area.

“There would then need to be a sustained level of maintenance per annum,” he added.

Deputation to Leinster House

Responding to the contents of the presentation, Chair of the MD, Fine Gael's Val Smith said he didn't know if the situation regarding roads in the county was “getting better or worse.”

Cllr Kelly stated that drainage was a major issue, with Sinn Féin's Paddy McDonald agreeing.

Aontú's Sarah O'Reilly argued that due to the larger road network, coupled with concentration of industry in the area, that Bailieborough-Cootehill should received a larger proportion of funding and more staffing also.

Fine Gael's Carmel Brady meanwhile suggested that an appeal be made to the Department of Agriculture asking that a grant be given to farmers to clear roadside drains. She also suggested that a similar exercise, breaking down all the details for roads in other MDs be carried out, to build an argument for a deputation to bring to Leinster House looking for more roads funding.

Both Mr Lyons, and Director of Services Paddy Connaughton agreed with the assertion.