Erin McGreehan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I raise the issue of regional roads and their ability to safely deal with the volume of traffic travelling on them. Specifically, I highlight the route along R173, the R175 and onto the R176 and right on to the Border in north County Louth. This road is the main access road to the Cooley Peninsula. There are several primary schools located on it, and one secondary school. It is a regional route but it has the traffic volumes found on a national route.

I, too, would like to get the Minister for Transport to come into the House to discuss how we can finance local government to enable it to be able to undertake the upkeep of these regional routes to a higher standard, to get traffic calming measures put in place and to get a different focus placed on these regional routes, something which might be akin to a super-regional road as opposed to a standard regional route. I say this because it will never be possible to raise it to a national road standard, so it needs extra resources and to be given a higher priority. Far too many lives have been lost along this route from the Ballymac roundabout to Cornamucklagh House at the Border. Basically, I am asking that we would have a new classification of regional roads to enable them to cope with the large volume of traffic, which is, as I said, far more akin to that found on national routes. This route in north county Louth is the main spine of connectivity for the entire populace of the Cooley Peninsula. Many people live there, there is a great deal of industry, with Greenore Port being on that peninsula, and it is also an extremely important tourism area. To achieve road safety and to prepare for the future, we need to have a new standard of regional routes.