Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

---- and then one reverts back to motorway speed again. In the main, our motorway network is really well designed and it lends itself to driving at 120 km/h. Generally, that speed is safe. However, I want to give the Minister of State an example of a place where it is not safe, namely, junction 13 on the M18 from Limerick to Galway. This is the Tulla exit on the motorway. In 2018 a 57 year old man, Mr. Michael Fogarty from Crusheen lost his life there. He was exiting off the motorway at that point and was rear ended by a vehicle. I met his widow at my advice clinic in that village on Monday afternoon. At the time that he passed away, there was a huge public outpouring of support. The community stood with her and called for an action plan but unfortunately - it is human nature - that support tapered off as the years went by and she is now fighting a solo campaign. The coroner said that the acceleration zone for joining the motorway at that junction is half of what it should be and the deceleration zone for exiting the motorway is also half of what it should be. The road was built to dual carriageway minimum specifications but afterwards it became a motorway. The configuration of the junction is entirely inappropriate. A life was lost there but TII repeatedly comes back with wishy-washy answers on it. If we are going to look at speed limits we should consider reduced speed limits on certain sections of our motorway network, this being one of them. I ask the Minister of State to comment on that.