Council gets almost all of Naas road works done – by October
A macro image of a weathered British 'Men at Work' roadworks warning sign.
THE quiet achievements of local authorities is seldom acknowledged, but Kildare County Council has managed to complete an impressive 87 per cent of its planned roads improvement programme around Naas for 2024 – by the end of October.
This was revealed in the monthly update on ‘Municipal Roadworks’ given to elected members at the November meeting of the Naas Municipal District (MD) held last week.
“It’s very impressive, and it has been noted,” said councillor Fintan Brett.
“There’s been a massive amount of work done, massive is the only word, it’s been a very fruitful year.
“A huge amount of thanks has to go to (former area engineer) David Reel who set this up, and his successor Yasir Khan who is very good."
THE Fine Gael representative added: “He did say ‘give me a ball of money and I’ll get stuff done!’”
In total, 10kms of roads have been resurfaced to date at 18 locations around the MD – 17 of which are already completed.
The only project still outstanding in this category is Hollywood Park in Naas which is at “construction stage”.
Figures are even more impressive under the Local Property Tax (LPT)-funded works, with 14 out of 14 car park improvement projects, and three out of three of the road improvement completed by end of October.
The perfect record continues with the two planned drainage projects, and the single safety improvement works – the bends at Donode Little on the R411 – all getting completed in the first 10 months of the year.
The only blot on the council’s copybook, as it were, was in footpath completions, with only three of eight projects finished.
One – at The Park, Morrell – is under construction, while another four are at “pre-construction stage”.
However, the five outstanding projects in this sector have all been awarded tender so are due for completion rather than the long finger.
“The Naas MD restoration improvement, and restoration maintenance works programme for the year has been developed in line with the 2024 allocation from the Department of Transport,” said a spokesperson for the roads section.
“This is a very good team, and it’s been said many times by the members who appreciate the work, and you don’t always get to say it,” said cllr Brett.
“We’ve always had a great working relationship with the staff. They’ll always tell us what they’re doing, and by and large, if it needs to get done, it gets done,” he concluded.
