This article is from page 14 of the 2008-05-06 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 14 JPG
BATS and badgers are to benefit from a local building boom.
The creatures are to get their own means of safe passage around the proposed new Shannon Tunnel.
The €600 million project will take 40,000 vehicles off the streets of Limerick city, but it will be built right in the path of a number of crea- tures who need protection.
Kevin Cleary of White Young Green Consultants said that four badger sets have been identified within the construction site span-
ning the river between Coonagh and Bunlicky and a the same number of protected species of bats have been found along the construction site.
To prevent the badgers from meet- ing a terrible fate if they wander on to the tunnel road, the construction will include badger fencing, which is sunk into the ground to prevent them burrowing and specially constructed underpasses the help them cross the road.
The mature tress which are home to the bats will now only be felled at certain times of the year to allow the bats time to breed and rear young and
once they are cut down , they will be left without further disturbance for 24 hours to allow their winged in- habitants to move home.
The biggest engineering project in the midwest region, the fourth river crossing’s new planned route in- cludes 11 bridges and each will be complete with two bat boxes and a bat fly-over.
“This means keeping the vegeta- tion raised to a certain height to al- low bats, which rely on sonar, to stay clear of traffic and other dangerous obstacles’, said Mr Cleary..
And birds and other wildlife are to
get a newly constructed wetland and dry reserve to compensate for the loss of 15 per cent of habitats in the area.
Rare plant species, meanwhile, will be experimentally transplanted to the Trinity Botanic Gardens.
The tunnel scheme is hailed as the answer to congestion on the roads into Limerick
It will also act as a method of short- ening journeys and cutting costs for commercial transport.
The construction was approved by An Bord Pleanala in 2004 after a five year period of consultation.