Councillors clash over whether to give priority to pedestrians
The mayor of Mullingar has been accused of “not living in the real world” over her stance on discouraging traffic from entering the town.
Cllr Paddy Hill reacted with incredulity after Green Party mayor, Cllr Hazel Smyth, suggested at the February meeting of the Municipal District of Mullingar Kinnegad that some of the car parks in Mullingar could become “wonderful outdoor spaces”.
“It should be ‘people first’ not just ‘car users first’,” she said.
Cllr Hill, who is from Finea, retorted that people from his “neck of the woods” who come in to Mullingar, who shop in Mullingar, and who are important to Mullingar, have to use their own transport: “They’re not going to ride bicycles into it; there’s no bus services into it,” he said, warning that it was going to be a bad day for the town if rural people were to stop going in and doing business there.
“There’s measures being proposed that are going to absolutely destroy this country!” he continued as he went on to state that environmentalists were mistaken if they thought that removing cars from towns in “little Ireland” was going to make a difference when China is opening lots of coal-fired power stations and the UK is set to re-open a coal mine.
“Why is your attention not turning to those people?” he asked Cllr Smyth in raised tones.
“In Brazil, for instance, they want to increase the cattle herd by 24 million – and you asking people here to reduce their herds. You will destroy rural Ireland. That’s what’s going to happen if you get away with your policies!”
Cllr Hill was speaking in favour of a motion by Cllr Andrew Duncan (FG) pleading that the council endeavour to include in the town plan measures to protect the existing car parking spaces along Mullingar’s main streets.
Cllr Duncan spoke of what he termed growing hostility towards the car and warned that Mullingar town centre risked becoming “one large pedestrianised coffee shop-plaza”.
Stating that he had been “pretty annoyed” by the threats of funding withdrawal made by Transport Minister Eamon Ryan on his recent visit to the area, but that the ‘hostility’ towards the car was not just an Irish phenomenon, Cllr Duncan said the shift was failing to take into account the impact such a move was going to have on town centres.
“The reality is,” he said of the minister’s policies, “not everybody agrees with that programme, that ‘the car is the enemy’.
“If you do not have car parking available in town centres, the likelihood is that the town centre – that vibrant diverse town centre that is there – will become one large pedestrianised coffee shop-land. And that’s the direction we are headed.”
Cllr Duncan said that could be seen already in the UK, where some of that country’s most historical town centres have been destroyed.
He said some planning policies simply do not stand up to scrutiny, and it was the responsibility of representatives to represent the views of the people who elect them.
“And there are many businesses in Mullingar who do not like the slow erosion and removal of car parking from the town,” he said.
“I would be worried that the direction we are headed will, over a period of time, take cars out of the town centre. And there will be people who will think that’s a good idea – but I am not one of them, there are many others who don’t agree with the same policy either.”
Cllr Duncan warned that businesses will close over the strategy.
The formal written response to Cllr Duncan’s motion stated that all street space will be examined with a view to maximising the efficiency of pedestrian and traffic movements, including car parking.
“I am not happy with the response,” he stated. “It’s a complacent response. I’m looking for a real bit of clarity here in relation to car parking not about the needs of pedestrians.”
Cllr Emily Wallace said she fully supported the motion: Mullingar was, she said, reliant on the three-quarters of its visitors who do not live in the town. Further, she continued, the infrastructure is not there to get people with mobility or other issues into the town.
“The fleadh showed how tight a community we are and how accessible we are, and that has to be protected,” she said.
Support came too from Cllr Ken Glynn: “I one thousand per cent support the sentiment that our town centre needs the vibrancy of people coming in to the town centre to do their business to do their shopping,”
“The only way, at this moment in time, that anyone can come into this town that lives outside of town or within a couple of kilometres of it is by car: that’s the reality of it,” he said.
Cllr Denis Leonard remarked that there are competing interests at play: “I think there’s a myth out there that somehow by taking away parking spaces, we’re supporting the green agenda. I think what’s wrong with travel is people sit there for hours with emissions going in the air.”
However, he continued, from 2030 on motorists will be using hydrogen vehicles, biofuels or electricity and they will not be causing the damage that they are today.
“Don’t forget we are a rural town; a lot of people take their kids into school, they shop in the town and we are now downgrading the services in rural towns to an alarming end that means most people have to come to Mullingar more than ever for things that heretofore they did not have to come for.”
He added that we have an ageing population, many living in rural areas not served by buses that could take them in to Mullingar.
Cllr Smyth said, however, that she could not support the motion: “We are living in a climate emergency; we’re living in an energy crisis as well – and yet the emphasis is still being put on the car as being the main source of transport.”
Cllr Smyth said that the fleadh had shown what the town could be like without cars, and while she accepted that there was a need for car parking, she did not feel it should be the main focus.
“It should be ‘people first’ not just ‘car users first’,” she said, prompting the ire of Cllr Hill.