Local and regional road maintenance initiative is good news for Cork – Clune

Fine Gael Senator Deirdre Clune is welcoming the announcement from the Minister for Transport, Tourism & Sport Leo Varadkar on a new initiative to maintain rural roads by allowing local authorities to allocate Government road funding of €42 million on the upkeep and maintenance of the existing road network. This allows local councils to use 30% of this grant for emergency repair works on local and regional roads.  

The Minister’s statement allows for a flexible approach from local authorities so they can reallocate up to 30% of funding from funds allocated for road improvement works and use it for immediate and urgent repairs.

This will allow individual authorities more freedom in how they spend their roads grants, and allow them to focus monies on emergency repairs as they see fit using their local expertise and knowledge.

In Cork, potholes are a serious issue following the bad weather we have had in recent times. This can be dangerous causing damage to cars and creating unsafe driving conditions.

This is a sensible and common sense move as local authorities are under pressure to improve road conditions with little funding.

The option of using this money on immediate issues provides a solution to the pothole problem in the area and I would encourage the authorities in Cork to act without delay and address the level of road disrepair before a bad situation becomes worse.