Vacancies lead to delay in Kildare road improvements
Photo for illustrative purposes only
There will be further delays to the road widening project in Athgarvan after it emerged that there is still a lack of resources to commence the project.
Kildare County Council (KCC) made the admission after being pressed on the matter by Cllr Tracey O’Dwyer at the most recent meeting of Kildare Newbridge Municipal District.
The project was due to commence in the first quarter of this year, but the council told cllr O’Dwyer back in June that it had been delayed due to staff constraints.
In September, cllr O’Dwyer called on the council to deliver the road widening project as well as upgraded traffic lights system at Athgarvan junction, taking into consideration that the infrastructure projects had been on the long finger for 20 years.
Work on upgrading the traffic lights system recently commenced.
Cllr O’Dwyer asked the council at a recent municipal district meeting that, taking into consideration the current disruption in the village to facilitate the work on upgrading the traffic lights, it commences the road widening project in January “to avoid further disruption at a later time and to avail of the cost savings through shared traffic management systems”.
Cllr O’Dwyer described the project as “critical”.
However, a representative from the council at the meeting said that there are several vacancies in the road department and so the council does not currently have the capacity for the project.
A report issued Daragh Conlon, acting senior engineer on the projects team at KCC, detailed further that there are currently no resources available in the roads capital team budget “to commence this project at short notice due to the large workload of projects currently being progressed”.
The report added that there is “detailed design and procurement” necessary before the commencement of works and that those tasks will only be completed after the traffic light works are finished.
