Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Chairman is absolutely correct. Although I accept the northern distributor road does not come under the patronage of TII, I could not wait for it to happen because there is a commuter benefit. Leaving that to one side, there is an area straddling the Clare-Limerick county boundary, Redgate in Caherdavin, which is well known to the Chairman. At the moment, three or four bungalows have been fenced off because they are wedged between a new build and the extension row build, and the owners do not know whether, for the next year, two years or three years, their homes will become a fenced-off piece of road with traffic cones all around them. This is happening in the Clare-Limerick area but it could happen in any other county, with the way trends in inflationary costs are going. I am glad TII has a developing thought process on this. It merits further discussion.

The N67 is a beautiful spinal route along the west coast of County Clare and the Wild Atlantic Way. Buses and tourists travel up and down it every day. Along the road, there is Rineen national school, west County Clare. It is the most beautiful setting for a school, with a lovely yard where the kids can play, but one of the most dangerous roads in the country passes in front of it. I have met the principal and visited the school. Clare County Council has brought forward some proposals to TII and the matter is in a state of flux. While I do not expect our guests to have the answer here today, they might revert to indicate what the agency will do about it. The issue relates to a form of traffic calming. A national road and a primary school do not sit well together, with tourism and a lot of other things happening in the area.

The Cork-Limerick motorway matters a great deal to all of us in the west of Ireland and it is great to see a bit of progress through a definitive route line emerging. The Chairman was pressing our guests on when this might happen. The worry is that the route is several years off yet. As I have seen in my county, when a new road is mooted, all focus and attention goes onto the new road route and other, ancillary stuff planned around it to make it safer may fall by the wayside. I am concerned about junctions such as O'Rourke's Cross, Banogue and all the way to Charleville. Many people in the west of Ireland traverse those communities on their way from Ennis and Limerick and down to Cork. I am concerned they might be left by the wayside now that a preferred route, a few fields over, has been decided. That needs to be on TII's agenda.

On the matter of road safety, the N18, the Limerick-Shannon-Ennis dual carriageway, becomes a motorway after Shannon. There have been a number of accidents, including two fatalities, in that Bunratty-Cratloe area since November. There is a lot going on there. A fast-moving carriageway bends on the road near Setrights Tavern in Crathloe. There is the Radisson hotel, a series of roundabouts and the Limerick tunnel. It is hectic. There is a need for some measures there, certainly on the exit ramps at Cratloe and perhaps at the roundabout at the Radisson, to control traffic somewhat. If I am not mistaken, the speed limit for coming into that roundabout, until recently at least, was 100 km/h. There was no graduated reduction from 80 km/h to 60 km/h coming into the roundabout; it was a full-on, 100 km/h, which is wrong and is in breach of guidelines. Again, our guests do not have to have all the answers here today, but they might take away my questions for further consideration.

Many new road builds have footpaths and cycleways alongside them. The design of roads has improved an awful lot, but I have continuously seen that when the infrastructure opens, the maintenance does not necessarily follow well. The cycleway will have thistles growing through it two or three years later. Maintenance does not always follow the works and the infrastructure starts to decay. I have seen good and bad examples in my county. An excellent contractor maintains the N18, but some of the ancillary stuff beside it is not so well maintained. The Scandi countries have started installing new cat’s eyes along the road whenever something new is being built. There is a small thermostat within the cat’s eye that lights up in blue when there is ice on the road, and it turns out this cat’s eye is the same price, when bought in bulk, as the standard cat’s eye that is used in Ireland. While our guests might not have the answer to this question either, they might examine the idea as a simple change, when new roads are being built, to install temperature-sensitive cat’s eyes in order that motorists will know if there is ice ahead and they need to slow down. Given other countries are doing it, it should be factored into our road design build in Ireland as well.

If our guests could send a note on some of the questions, that would be very helpful.