The members of the Belmullet Electoral Area Committee gave their go ahead for their section of improvement works to be carried out on the N59 low cost improvement scheme from Westport to Mulranny this week. The members were told it was vital they give the go-ahead to enable the councilsecure funding by the end of the year - failing which - there might be no funding for it next year.
Director of services and county engineer Joe Beirne said there was 40km of road included in the scheme and, while they did not expect to get funding for the whole stretch in one go, they would hope that once the initial funding was made available for the first sections, other funding would come on stream later in the year.
Senior engineer Tony McNulty said the council had made good progress with landowners, following the good relationship that had been built up when the greenway project was carried out by the council in the past few years. Mr McNulty explained that once the members of the Belmullet committee gave their approval it would go before the Westport area committee on Monday morning next and then the full county council meeting in the afternoon.
Once the part eight had been completed, the council would be in a position to issue the CPO documents in mid-December which was the next vital stage in the timetable of the scheme to make sure that they were able to draw down the funding for the project. The elected members of the committee complimented the staff of Mayo County Council for the work they done to date in bringing such an ambitious project forward and praised the work of the council in engaging with the local landowners.
