Council agrees to look at Ballagh road cul-de-sac

To turn the road at Ballagh /Cullionbeg into a cul-de-sac will not be a simple process, Cllr Aoife Davitt was informed when she told Municipal District of Mullingar Kinnegad officials that it was what the residents of the area wanted.

“The district engineer met with the residents association and various interventions were constructed during the summer months. The request to make the road a cul-de-sac would require agreement, planning permission and funding,” the official response to Cllr Davitt’s motion stated.

Putting forward the case for the change, Cllr Davitt said the road had what she termed “a very peculiar placement”, being parallel to a major road, and motorists using it drove at speed as if it had the same surface and speed limit as the nearby main road.

“The residents there have been on to, I’d say probably everybody that’s sitting in this room at this point,” Cllr Davitt continued, adding that every resident of the road had signed a petition in support of the cul-de-sac proposal.

“They actually feel at this point the only way to stop the speeding on the road is to make it a cul-de-sac… they really feel at this point there is absolutely no other way that they can go forward apart from this measure,” she said, adding that while solutions were being considered, ramps, lighting, footpaths were all discussed and also signage but none of the measures of this nature already installed as improvements had alleviated the speeding problem.

“There have been numerous collisions on the road,” she said.

Completely in support of Cllr Davitt’s call was Cllr Andrew Duncan, who said that he heard the same concerns when he canvassed that area.

“I also spoke to them in relation to a number of solutions, and I actually believe that that is the only solution that will work,” he said, adding that the road is not fit for the traffic that’s now on it, and it’s not fit for the large trucks that use it as a means to bypass the main road.

Also in support of the motion were Cllr Mick Dollard and Cllr Ken Glynn.

Director of services, Deirdre Reilly, confirmed that in May she had received a letter from the residents outlining the issues they were enduring. She said that the letter had not mentioned the cul-de-sac option, and said if that course were to be taken, it would involve extinguishment of a right of way.

Ms Reilly undertook to look into what the process of extinguishment of a right-of-way was and to come back to the members with a report.