Negativity about Mayo town has been 'terrible'

TV architect Hugh Wallace is to be invited to Castlebar to follow up on radio comments he made about the town being "depressing".

Mr Wallace made a number of negative comments about the county town when he featured as a guest on the Oliver Callan Show on RTE Radio 1 on August 29 last.

The matter was raised by Cllr Ger Deere at the September meeting of Castlebar MD who said the "negativity on Castlebar has been terrible". Cllr Deere questioned whether Mr Wallace even knew Castlebar and said the council should invite him to the town.

Cllr Deere added that a number of other issues around the town needed attention and that the council also needed to speak to Bus Eireann because "their GPS is bringing them down Spencer Street and causing gridlock".

“Can we ask them to use the ring road and go down to the bus stop that way, because they don’t need to come through Spencer Street.” 

He added that the gullies around the town were "rock solid, with grass coming up through them, so that we are going to have a problem with flooding as soon as the leaves fall", and said there were also "serious issues" on Hopkins’ Road, around Staunton’s Barbers, where the left hand side of the curb is "six inches higher than the other side".

“A lady fell there last week and was lucky she didn’t split her head. At least one to two a week fall crossing left to right. Maybe it was never finished properly.” 

Cllr Deere also said that state service providers, particularly for broadband, are leaving footpaths around the town in a terrible state, adding: “Footpaths are falling apart. We will have a flood of claims over this. We need to see the bond fee increased and some joined up thinking on this.” 

Cllr Gavin said he also wanted to raise some issues that he had already raised before, including on footpaths. 

“Some of these in housing estates are just gone beyond repair, such as in Woodland Park at Kilkenny Cross, and at the back of Castlehill Park one has collapsed. Also at Davitt's Terrace and coming up from Pontoon Drive, and Milebush, we need to make it safe for the residents there.

“Then we need to look at Cloonkeen because there is serious flooding out there. I also ask that we have an update on the programme for cutting hedges.

“Also, the road markings at Kilkenny Cross where you cut onto the new road. A lot of people are commuting by bike from there to the new bridge on the new road and it is highly dangerous, and the same goes for the old Keelogues road.” 

Cllr Gavin added: “I think it’s very important we write to our Chief Executive because some of our engineering and senior staff have left and existing staff are under savage pressure.” 

He added that the council should monitor contractors doing utility works to ensure they reinstate roads and paths to their previous conditions.

Cllr Michael Kilcoyne commented: “Fifteen years ago there were 35 people employed in the UDC district but now in the MD we only have two.” 

Cllr Harry Barrett wanted to know how the MD was planning to proceed to meet the needs of residents along Rocklands, towards the golf club, following the receipt by members of a letter requesting intervention by residents there.

In relation to footpaths, he believed the worst one was that outside the Sacred Heart Hospital, saying: “There are numerous trip hazards there for elderly people making their way into that hospital."

MD Head David Mellett said he would action all matters raised and commented: “On footpath repairs, some are quite large. The Sacred Heart is quite a sizeable piece of work, so we would be coming with footpath repairs as part of your roads programme and bringing that before ye.

“We do try and do the small repairs on a daily basis but would be in favour of a more strategic approach for big jobs like these.

“Regarding Milebush residents, I was to have a report for this meeting but only got their submission for this meeting. There is an outline programme of works with a view to more works next year and the engineer is working with residents on this.” 

Following further discussion on works needing doing around Castlebar it was agreed that members would hold a workshop with management on the situation.