Mayo County Council senior engineer Joe Beirne gave a warning to the elected members of Mayo County Council that he couldn’t see any major roads projects starting in Mayo in the next six years. Beirne was informing the council of the roads programmes for 2009 at the council’s annual budget meeting.
Beirne went on to say that the major roads projects that have been planned for Mayo, including the second phase of the N26 from Ballina to Bohola and the N5 Bohola to Westport dual carriageway, were in danger of slipping down the list of priorities of the National Roads Authority. Mr Beirne also encouraged the members to lobby hard national politicians had to ensure that the roads projects get under way as soon as possible.
Fine Gael Councillor and chairperson of the Mayo County Council Roads SPC Michelle Mulherin told the meeting that “we need to lobby hard to ensure that our major urban routes are built and don’t end up being just lines on a map.” She continued saying that the reason that Mayo was not receiving the funding on par with other areas was because of the lack of political clout of the Government TDs. “The reason that we are not getting priority is because of the lack of political clout and the sad thing is as well that once Transport 21 ends in 2015 there is no commitment to give us the new roads once that capital programme is over.”
Labour Party Cllr Johnny Mee put his own colourful description on the state of the current situation the major Mayo roads projects find themselves in: “the upgrade of the N5 is comparable with such grandiose aspirations as the draining of the Shannon and the ending of partition. Westport is the jewel of the west in relation to tourism and look at the roads in and out of it.”
