New footbridge over the Barrow mooted again for Athy

A COUNCILLOR believes there is still the possibility to remove a further 500 cars daily from the centre of Athy, despite being told his idea was “not reasonable nor practical”.

At the recent Athy Municipal District meeting, cllr Mark Leigh asked “that the council applies for funding for a feasibility study for a footbridge and cycleway at Rathstewart (across the Barrow, between K Leisure and St Michael’s) from the NTA Active Travel Scheme”.

This would allow westside students at the schools on the Monasterevin Road to access their places of study on bicycle or on foot, instead of being school-run through the centre of town twice a day, however, the formal position of Kildare County Council was not promising. 

“The current programme of schemes being examined by Kildare County Council that are funded by the National Transport Authority (NTA) has been streamlined in recent years to better fit the annual allocation of around €10m per annum,” explained Donal Hodgins, a senior engineer at the Transport Section in his formal reply to the motion.

“Given that the total estimated cumulative cost for existing projects is in excess of €130m, the programme for the next 10 years consists of existing schemes being designed and constructed.

"It is therefore not reasonable nor practical to add additional schemes."

However, this was the sixth time Cllr Leigh had raised this issue since he was first elected over five years ago, and he seemed to be meeting the same brick wall.

“I asked at previous meetings, and was told to apply to the NTA’s Active Travel Scheme, however, when I did, I was absolutely appalled that South Kildare is not included anywhere on this,” he said.

“This scheme has been on the books since 1982, and is in the Local Area Plan (LAP) as a key piece of infrastructure. You can’t build a cycleway across Crom a Boo Bridge, there’s no room because it’s medieval.

“I’ve had this up six time since I was elected, and I think the vast majority of the executive staff at the council agree with me. I have been told (by the council) that a feasibility study is in progress by the NTA about this, and I expect an email on this answer soon”.

The NTA has denied this while Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) has been approached to confirm, or deny this claim, but hasn't commented at this stage.