footpath needed

emmemm

At the top of Glencar from Gala store down to the housing estate.
Vehicles travelling at 100kph past Gala can't see walkers on the left side and if there is an oncoming vehicle a fatality will occur unless a footpath is laid.
Strange it wasn't part of the planning.
Another example of how much Letterkenny town council despises pedestrians.
Or maybe sheer incompetence.

muffler

One for a young Mr Blake to respond to if he still visits.

emmemm

didn't like to mention any names....the last time I got scolded:rolleyes:

muffler

emmemm wrote:

didn't like to mention any names....the last time I got scolded:rolleyes:

Possibly you did.

If memory serves me right was the last one not a little rant with demands built into it unlike your present comment which of course is completely acceptable

emmemm

can't remember now.
must check it out.:)

emmemm

not there.
must have been someone else.
I never rant:rolleyes:

byte

By Gala, do you mean Nyne's Gala, where there is also a pub and Chips2Go etc?

If it is, I do agree that the bit from the crossroads down to the houses is very dodgy for pedestrians, where cars do seem to travel too fast on what is an atrocious road surface.

Also, that stretch is supposed to be a 60km/h limit.

donegalman1

Is it not an agreement with developers to rebuild the road and footpaths as they build further up that road.

All the work so far was part of a planning order that the roads etc were upgraded by developers.

emmemm

No houses on this piece as yet.
the road surface there has been atrocious for years..all humps and hollows.
somebody congratulated the council last year for the good job done on the road...lol.


Seem to be plenty houses in the area already.Obviously more to come.
Pity the council hasn't aquired some land as a play/relaxation area for the residents.I'm sure the increasing numbers of kids on the estate need a kick about area.

DCC lacking in foresight a.p.u.

jimmycrackcorm

Why should this road be given a footpath simply because some developer decided to put a shop at the top?

emmemm

what a strange question.
ever walk anywhere?

muffler

jimmycrackcorm wrote:

Why should this road be given a footpath simply because some developer decided to put a shop at the top?

developer didn't just get out of bed one day and say to himself - "Hey I'll build a shop there". He would have done his homework first from a business point of view and then would have gone through the planning process and proved that the shop would provide a service to the local population.

Road safety is a critical issue in all planning applications and Im sure it was no different with this one. I suspect that the developer was to have included a footpath as part of the overall development or have made a substantial contribution to the local council to enable them to carry out the works.

Anyhow these planning files are available for inspection by the public so maybe someone might want to check it out to see what the real story is.

donegalman1

I thiink you are missing jimmys point Muffler. A developer has decided to capitalise on this area. He should be made at least contribute to the infastructure. Something of this nature should require that, not just when the houses go up.

there's a shop in Churchill, should the council place foot paths out there or indeed the whole way out. same as roads between towns where delevopments are.

Obviously what Jimmy is pointing out is that this is development driven and the developer should have some responsibility and the council shouldn't be following developers around with workmen and resources to facilitate them.personal attacks are not alowed, read the charter

nanook

donegalman, play nice.

Yellow card me thinks for this one.

jimmycrackcorm

what did I miss ? what did I miss? something exciting happened - someone nearly got a ban.

Ah it's been so quiet since Paddy20's ban days. Might as well rename Killyclug to Sleepy hollow.

donegalman1

I was referring to the part now edited out of the previous post by muffler. The post as is now is fair enough, and I did add that it was uncharacteristic.

emmemm

arguing who should pay for a footpath is of little consequence to the mother pushing a buggy up to the shop with a 40 foot lorry hurtling down toward her and boy racers zooming up behind her...that scenario scares me...but is happening frequenly.
surely, in the case of a local shop, the footpath should be built before the shop is allowed to open.

as for all this deleting nonsense, who needs it?
one of the beauties of the net is that anonymity should allow for free speech as long as no law is broken.

DB where are you?

Damien Blake

Morning, all.

I assume we're talking about the Petrol station at the top of Killyclug, as mentioned earlier?

There's been fierce bother with the infrastructure in that area, coming from the planning. I wouldn't blame the developers too much either. That petrol station is right on the edge of the Milford electoral area, so it's planning would have been handled form Milford rather than from Letterkenny. As such, they could not have been mandated to provide footpaths etc towards the estates in the town area (eg every housing estate before the junction, the Grange, all the Solomons, Windmill View etc but not the new estates being builty directly opposite).

The reason the road was so bad there for so long, and that there was such difficulty in getting the road fixed, is that the boundary between Letterkenny Town Council and Donegal County Council's Letterkenny and Milford areas ran down the middle of it. The Dev Charges for the buildings, petrol station and housing estates were collected in Milford Area, and were spent by the Milford area section of the council. They then tried to pass on the responsibility for the road to Letterkenny TC, when it did not fall within our boundary. There was a lot of work done to resolve the situation with the road, including lobbying of all councillors in both Letterkenny and Milford areas, and plenty of press coverage. Eventually, it was sorted out and the road was fixed.

This kind of thing drives me absolutely mental. It's not the first time it has happened; there are a number of estates that were granted planning by Donegal Co Co just outside the Town Council boundary that were not served properly by roads or footpaths. The Town Boundary was then extended, and they became our problems which we are spending fortunes to fix. Donegal Co Co has now gone a put a near-absolute restriction on building in the areas just outside the Town Boundary, meaning we've gone from a situation where whole estates could be built distant from the Town Centre, to a situation where people born and raised in Letterkenny cannot build their own home anywhere, through a combination of high prices for land within the town and restrictions on planning outside the town boundary. Only people from Letterkenny are hit like this, under the current county plan.

As regards the provision of a footpath: during my term as Mayor, a proposal came forward from Donegal Co Co to re-align the roads up there, including purchasing homes to knock down and to build a new roundabout. I voted against the initial proposal, as it was premature, and then supported the revised proposal which will see a major roundabout at the Junction of the Petrol Station, together with improved, widened roads towards the town via Glencar Road (The Grange direction and Solomons Hill/Fernhill direction). This will also involve building footpaths to connect with the existing ones.

Letterkenny TC has gotten very tough on planning conditions regarding pedestrian access and bringing infrastructure into an area. The new developments in the Rahan area have had to provide massive investment in water and sewerage for the South bank of the Swily. Developments in Lismonaghan have had to provide footpaths and road widening outside of their own land holdings, which hadn't happened before. We only have to look at the massive works being undertaken at Ballymacool, where the developer has built a massive new road with footpaths etc towards the Conwall graveyard to see this in operation.

So, in short, the footpaths will be in place fairly soon. There are works to be done on site there later this year. Hopefully roads with roundabouts will be finished next year, with the footpaths sorted sooner than that.

Have to run now, but any questions leave them below and I'll get to them later today hopefully

byte

Thanks for the informative reply, Damien. That's a crazy carry-on with regards to the Milford/Letterkenny boundaries.

Anyway, at least we now know efforts are being made to somehow sort out what really is a dodgy stretch of road.

donegalman1

Damien,as informative as ever makes a good point.

Its perhaps interesting that we rarely get info on how Donegal is divided up and whos paying what for what. Perhaps were this info more common knowledge then there might not be as negative a view taken towards local authorities.

I wonder do the local authorities in Donegal have information officers who could make decisions and their reasoning better known rather than just what we read about from councillors meetings.

I realise in planning matters its really left up to affected individuals to do their research and lodge complaints etc but maybe we would have more faith in planning should decisions be made easily available.

On the otherhand can we be sure that developments are not allowed just as a means to provide infastructure also. If a developer puts in a sweetner, no matter how long it takes them to fufill does this give them an advantage I wonder?

emmemm

Thanks for the detailed answer DB.
I wonder is there any chance of reserving a few fields around the town for woods/green areas to soften the concrete jungle effect.
Hindsight will be too late in this case.

muffler

jimmycrackcorm wrote:

Why should this road be given a footpath simply because some developer decided to put a shop at the top?

Jimmy I owe you an apology. I only glanced at your post and wrongly assumed you meant - why should there be a footpath at this location - full stop! I didnt really notice the reference to the developer. I can see where you are coming from with this and donegalman1 would have explained your thinking in any event. We are all in agreement on this so i am happy to set the record straight.

donegalman1 wrote:

I thiink you are missing jimmys point Muffler. A developer has decided to capitalise on this area. He should be made at least contribute to the infastructure. Something of this nature should require that, not just when the houses go up.

Again we are in agreement on this. I think if you read my post you will see that I did state that the developer most likely would have been responsible for the provision of a footpath either directly or indirectly

K-9

I know where I live the 2 develepor's widened the road, put in turning lanes and widened a bridge and they where planning conditions and rightly so.

The problem, madly! in this case seems to be the town boundary.

annascott

People are not supposed to walk where there are no footpaths. . .

muffler

Please dont gravedig old threads.

Thread locked.