Mr. Shaun Cunniffe:

I offer my sincere thanks to the Cathaoirleach and committee for having us here today. My name is Shaun Cunniffe. I was a serving councillor on Galway County Council until 2019 and was part of many debates and discussions about the complementary use of the closed railway alignment from Athenry to Claremorris as a greenway initially and should a business case ever recommend the reinstatement of a railway, then to use this broad alignment for both. Bord Fáilte attended our Tuam municipal meetings and requested that we develop this greenway and detailed the success of the great western greenway in Mayo in which it had invested.

Mr. Barry Kenny from Irish Rail explained that if ever a railway was to be reinstated, all the track, sleepers and foundations, which is the ballast, would all be replaced with modern rail infrastructure and that there would be very heavy machinery involved so if a greenway was temporarily on the railway, it could simply be moved to one side of the alignment and fenced off.

The campaign for the Galway section of the line to be given the greenway treatment is known as "The Quiet Man" greenway campaign, a name that comes from the famous 1950s film that was shot on location using the station at Ballyglunin, known as Castletown in the movie, which ranks as one of the most recognisable rail stations in American cinematographic history.

Being from Tuam, I know there is overwhelming support for the greenway. The petition we are talking about today has more than 9,000 signatures from people based in Galway. In September 2018, more than 3,000 people marched in Tuam on a Sunday afternoon to apply pressure on Galway County Council to support the idea of a feasibility study on the greenway.

The feasibility study funded by Transport Infrastructure Ireland was finally published in November 2023. This study looked at the choice of routes that might be available for a greenway from Athenry to Tuam and on to the county border with Mayo at Milltown. The detailed feasibility study concluded that the preferred option for a greenway in terms of environmental impact, costs and deliverability was to use the closed railway alignment. We know it makes common sense to do this, so why will it not happen?

The reason is that there is still a legacy cohort of opinion, contrary to all the conclusions of all independent reports, which considers a railway on this route a possibility. However, this cohort is now prioritising rail freight because the established criteria for the reinstatement of a passenger service are simply absent. Demographic data details that the extremely low and dispersed population along the route, the presence of a new motorway alongside this alignment and excellent private bus services all negate any case for passenger services.

Despite being unable to supply our greenway group or local media with the name of any company in County Galway that requires freight, they are holding fast. Equally, they can offer no explanation as to why Galway city, with a mainline rail and numerous powerful companies employing tens of thousands of staff, does not use or seek the use of rail freight, nor can they name one IDA announcement in the last ten years anywhere in Ireland that requires rail freight.

In 2023, the new all-island strategic rail review was published and despite the known facts of every independent report that has been published on the western rail corridor, we were told that the railway was going to go ahead at some stage in the future between Athenry and Claremorris, apparently for freight only, but with no promises of when this might happen.

Sadly, there is no promise of a railway happening in the near future and no promise of a greenway happening. We know from the feasibility study that this is the best and only route for a greenway to connect Mayo, so why wait? The argument to build the greenway now and if a railway is to happen, to put a railway with a greenway in alongside it in the future, has never been stronger.

The 42 km great western greenway in County Mayo generated a local economic benefit of €39 million in 2016, creating more than 910 new permanent jobs, direct and indirect. This economic impact is eminently possible along "The Quiet Man" greenway, which is the Tuam to Milltown section.

Our political system in east Galway needs to explain why we are spurning such vital economic impetus when emigration of our young people is mushrooming. Surely, for the sake of our children and the survival of our communities, our schools and our LGFA, GAA and other sporting clubs, we can come to a resolution. After all, politics is so often championed as the art of the possible, and our young people need this art now.