Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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554. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport if he will consider instructing the National Roads Authority and Road Safety Authority to introduce a reduced speed limit in the vicinity of a primary school (details supplied) in County Mayo; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [44005/14]

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
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Sections 4 to 8of the Road Traffic Act 2004 established speed limits for defined classes of roads, varying from 120 km/h on motorways to 50 km/h on public roads.  Other speed limits that may be applied under those sections, and section 9 of the Act, include 30 km/h; 60 km/h; and 100km/h.

Under section 9 of the Act, statutory responsibility for setting special speed limits in respect of any specific public road or part thereof is vested in local authorities and that section also sets out the range of special speed limits that may be established by such authorities through bye-laws.

To assist in the setting of appropriate speed limits, my Department issued Guidelines for the Application of Special Speed Limits to all local authorities in January 2011 and the onus is on local authorities to take these Guidelines into account in relation to any special speed limits that they may set.

In the case cited by the Deputy, therefore, the relevant local authority has the necessary powers to provide for a Special Speed Limit in the vicinity of a school, if the authority deems such a limit to be appropriate and necessary. Special speed limits may include periodic speed limits which can be designed to apply and operate at specified periods, for example when children are arriving at and leaving a school.