New traffic lights planned on Skehard Road. Still time to object!

beer enigma

Chris O'Leary is the only one who seems to be replying to be honest !

Voting for and against was as follows:


PART 8 - SKEHARD ROAD IMPROVEMENT SCHEME.
An Chomhairle considered the proposed scheme regarding Skehard Road Improvement Scheme and the report of the Assistant City Manager dated 9th June 2011 thereon. On the proposal of Comhairleoir C. O‟Leary, seconded by Comhairleoir T. Gould, a vote was called for where there appeared as follows:-

FOR: Comhairleoirí J. Kelleher, J. Kavanagh, P. Gosch, K. O‟Flynn, T. Fitzgerald, J. O‟Callaghan, D. Cahill, L. McGonigle, D. O‟Flynn, T. Shannon, K. McCarthy, J. Corr, S. Martin, J. Buttimer. (14)

AGAINST: Comhairleoirí T. Tynan, T. Gould, C. O‟Leary, M. Finn, M. Ahern, H. Cremin, G. Gibbons. (7) 12

The full motion with reasons for the development is listed in this PDF (starts at bottom of page 11)

Joanieb

Neil Prenderville is airing this topic tomorrow on 96.fm

Hogzy

Joanieb wrote: »

Neil Prenderville is airing this topic tomorrow on 96.fm

Can you post here when its on?

Joanieb

I will if I hear it. Today he said he would be talking about it but he never got round to it. I can play it back if I miss it

beer enigma

its on now

pwurple

At work, so missed it. Anything of use come out of it?

beer enigma

pwurple wrote: »

At work, so missed it. Anything of use come out of it?

In fairness to Prenderville he aired it between Chris O'Leary & Des Cahill - turned out to be a bit of a shouting match, but the expenditure provoked lots of follow up calls questioning the need for it.

Bizarrely, Des Cahill said he was against the removal of the roundabout yet he voted in favour of its removal !

There have been follow up letters written to the council requesting an 11th hr stay, but with the current works, I feel its probably too late for any major changes - didn't look to be too much left of the roundabout this morning.

Apparently going to do a follow up tomorrow morning, so I'll see what comes of that.

Joanieb

He had Chris O Leary and Des Cahill on. Dens Cahill actually admitted that he was against it but voted for it. There was a good bit of reaction to it. Nobody agreed with it!

pwurple

Was against it, but voted for it?

There's nothing some lines painted on the tarmac can't do to reinstate that roundabout.

Granted a lot of the money has been spent on the massive pipework they are doing. I can see the traffic lights have already been bought as well... they are over behind the fencing.

Did he ask anything about maintenance costs on lights and cycle lanes? The cycle lanes before mahon point are just lethal because they haven't been maintained properly. Where is the funding for this new raft of stuff coming from I wonder?

evilivor

pwurple wrote: »

Where is the funding for this new raft of stuff coming from I wonder?

Cork City Council was allocated more than €1.42m as part of the government’s Jobs Initiative,

Broken down: "€350,000 towards traffic calming, new pedestrian crossings and associated speed reduction measures in the Sunvalley Drive area of the city; €400,000 for the Cork Cycle network – Phase 1A. This forms a key section of the Cork City Cycle Network and will provide a safe and attractive cycle route of almost 5km between Douglas and the city centre; €300,000 for new footpaths and cycle lanes in the Boreenmanna Road area. ; €15,000 for new pedestrian crossing facilities at the Old Youghal Library, Togher Road, Tramore Road and Sundays Well; €50,000 for new signage to ensure the safe and efficient movement of freight traffic through the city; €100,000 for the installation of pedestrian counters at key locations to assist in the development of the city’s pedestrian strategy and €70,500 for the installation of permanent automatic traffic counters at locations to assist in developing pedestrian strategy to support retail, tourism and transport policies."

http://corkindependent.com/stories/item/3707/2011-32/City-gets-€1.4m-for-transport-projects

Joanieb

The traffic lights look as if they are going in now. New road markings being done. We noticed that the green area shown next to the lights on the up to date map is not going in........ Just a very large road....disgrace!!!!!!!!!

pwurple

Thanks Evilivor, I don't see anything about an allocation for the maintenance costs there. Is there nothing allocated?

evilivor

pwurple wrote: »

Thanks Evilivor, I don't see anything about an allocation for the maintenance costs there. Is there nothing allocated?

Dunno, hopefully. I was on the cycle lane from Mahon Point to towards the CSO at the weekend and it’s a disgrace – that “special” surface they is peeling off and it’s dreadful. Also, with the lack of decent drainage it was puddle sodden.

beer enigma

pwurple wrote: »

Thanks Evilivor, I don't see anything about an allocation for the maintenance costs there. Is there nothing allocated?

They apparently don't include maintenance in the figures as this money comes from an infrastructural pool & is purely for knocking things down and building something else - its a bit like Council Lego.

Heaven forbid maintenance - that's another pool altogether but I think the chappy who looks after that fell down a pothole somewhere because he's been awfully quiet recently :rolleyes:

Sad fact is that Cork City Council had an unused allocation in the infrastructure pool so rather than hand it back to Leo Varadkar had to come up with a scheme to use it. Lets just hope they have a similar allocation for next year when they decide to rebuild the roundabout.

Out of interest, one figure that is missing it the compulsory purchase amounts paid out for things like the Montessori Car Park

Joanieb

No Andip,

The Montessori car park is actually belonged to the City Council for years so they wouldn't have to pay for that.

beer enigma

Joanieb wrote: »

No Andip,

The Montessori car park is actually belonged to the City Council for years so they wouldn't have to pay for that.

Thanks - learn something new every day

pwurple

Ugh, they have the lines down. I was stuck at the junction for the first time ever this morning. Hate it when they spend money to make something worse. :mad:

beer enigma

pwurple wrote: »

Ugh, they have the lines down. I was stuck at the junction for the first time ever this morning. Hate it when they spend money to make something worse. :mad:

Just taken me 5 minutes to get from the roundabout at the bottom of the Well Road to the turning by Lovetts - suppose I'll have to get used to it !

cork_south

Fkn idiot city councilors, this is making my blood boil.
It is so frustrating being governed by clueless overpaid imbeciles. :mad:

charlemont

cork_south wrote: »

Fkn idiot city councilors, this is making my blood boil.
It is so frustrating being governed by clueless overpaid imbeciles. :mad:

That's because they know the people will put up with it, They can do they want as most people here are sheep.

beer enigma

charlemont wrote: »

That's because they know the people will put up with it, They can do they want as most people here are sheep.

What amazes me is how little notice they have to give people - if your neighbour wants to extend there have to be sufficient notices up so that people are aware of the development. I've knocked on most doors locally & very few knew anything about this,

two wheels good

Andip wrote: »

What amazes me is how little notice they have to give people - if your neighbour wants to extend there have to be sufficient notices up so that people are aware of the development. I've knocked on most doors locally & very few knew anything about this,

To be fair ... local residents received notices which included an A3 drawing in Spring 2011. The first deadline for objection letters was in early May 2011.

Joanieb

Hundreds of local people objected but were completely ignored!!!!!!

Xantia

It was on the Evening Echo today.
They needed funding for a footpath - (I could have given them a bag of cement)
Part of the funding was that they remove the roundabout.
It will end up like the one in Togher - lights off and use it as a roundabout.
This has cost over €1,000,000
Democracy is dead...

Joanieb

The lights are due to be switched on tomorrow night. There is a match on in Pairc Ui Caoibh on Sunday.......good God......

There is a water main under the roundabout which was laid there in 1962. This was brought to the attention of the city council at the planning stage by. Having spoken to the contractor today, we realised that they did not know the location of the water main and this will cause even more inconvenience to the travelling public and add even more to the cost. We have been told that the the road surface under the roundabout will have to be lowered by about 4/5 metres.

If they had left the roundabout alone and done the rest of the work they could have saved themselves a huge amount of expense and spared the motorists massive inconvenience not to mind the cost to the taxpayer.

The whole thing is an enormous disgrace. "gun put to our heads" who decided to remove the roundabout? Why? I heard that it was Dan Buggy, assistant city manager who overruled everybody. Councillors are afraid of him

Joanieb

Removing roundabouts is national policy? Has anyone ever driven through Dungarvan?

gbee

Joanieb wrote: »

Removing roundabouts is national policy? Has anyone ever driven through Dungarvan?

There is a syndrome for that, traffic lights and delays are causing mayhem, but someone has a roundabout that works great, so let's put in roundabout everywhere.

OH darn, that's not working!!!! I know, let's add back the lights and call them signalised roundabouts.

Darn those signalised roundabout are even more inefficient than the junctions with lights that were causing all the problems all along.

I got it, let's take away ALL roundabouts, especially those that DISPROVE our theories and prove that logical and individual location planning is, based on the actual usage of the particular facilities actually work better than a UNIVERSAL plan that BENEFITS the PROVIDERS of the in fracture, ie a PRIVATE company who actually make profit whilst providing a MORE expensive service than that which we could provide for ourselves with our own labour force.

AND as per the alterations to the Skehard road already, down by the Church, they are NOT DOING A GOOD JOB EITHER.

Joanieb

Ok. So someone who doesn't live here takes a decision to remove a perfectly working roundabout and make traffic queues. At the same time making churchyard lane a rat run endangering people's lives. I am convinced that cork city council don't give a damm about the quality of life of people who live in the area
I have lived in this area for 30 yrs. there has never been a problem at the roundabout. In fact it is the only piece of infrastructure that actually works here.
We will probably find out in 20 yrs time that a brown envelope was passed on to somebody in the city coucil to do this. I'll be 6 ft under but it infuriates me!!!!!!

beer enigma

two wheels good wrote: »

To be fair ... local residents received notices which included an A3 drawing in Spring 2011. The first deadline for objection letters was in early May 2011.

Not disputing what you say, but I didn't get one and I'm about six houses away from Churchyard Lane - I must have spoken to 50 or 60 households in Ardmahon & I'd say 5% knew of the scale of the works.

I wonder were they only delivered to the households on the road where the work is actually being carried out ?

two wheels good

Andip wrote: »

Not disputing what you say, but I didn't get one and I'm about six houses away from Churchyard Lane - I must have spoken to 50 or 60 households in Ardmahon & I'd say 5% knew of the scale of the works.

I wonder were they only delivered to the households on the road where the work is actually being carried out ?

I'll try to locate the initial notice. I wonder if was sent by the council or by an individual councillor, which might explain but not excuse a scattergun distribution.

Back in May 2011 a planning dept employee (who was reluctant to give his name. AFAIR he only gave his first name) told me they had received about 40 objections. He also stated that traffic lights were more efficient than a roundabout at handling traffic throughput.
My sister knocked on doors in Lake Lawn, Ardmahon, Well Road. Approx eighty she recalls. Some knew about the works, many didn't.