This article is from page 13 of the 2012-09-25 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 13 JPG
THE Office of Pubic Works (OPW) has failed to respond to an urgent request by Clare County Council to fix one of Clare’s busiest roads, which is in danger of falling into the sea.
It was revealed at yesterday’s North Clare Area meeting in Ennistymon that the Government agency, which last year assumed responsibility for all flooding and coastal erosion funding, has yet to respond to an urgent request for funding to protect a section of road between Liscannor and Lahinch from being washed into the sea.
The road is one of the main access roads used by tourists to access the Burren and also carries more than 700,000 people to or from the Cliffs of Moher each year.
“We have conveyed to them [the OPW] that we consider this work to be urgent. We have taken the step of getting an engineer to do a design of a retaining wall and the others works needed,” said Stephen Lahiffe, engineer with Clare County Council.
“We applied for this funding in 2012 and we have still to get a response – 2012 is nearly over and we have still to get a response. We have taken the step of getting a consultant engineer to come up with a design – so we are ready to go if we get a positive response.”
Ennistymon-based Cllr Richard Nagle (FF) asked for the council to invite down a member of the OPW to view the road, to ensure that Clare County Council would not be blamed by the government agency, if the road is lost to the sea.
“We need to emphasis to the OPW the importance of coastal erosion works at this location. The sea is rapidly eating the coastline away, it is undermining the road at this location and sooner or later that road will collapse,” he said.
“If it does collapse, then a lot of funding will be needed. This has been going on for several years and is getting worse and worse. It is an exposed and vulnerable area – we need to invite an officer from the OPW to come down and visit the site. This could be solved with a small investment now, it we wait until it collapses it will take a huge amount of money to replace it.”
It was also confirmed yesterday that € 40,000 allocated to strengthen the sea wall in Liscannor cannot be diverted to the road.