Kilkee councillor calls for bypass proposal to be shelved

ATTEMPTS by Kilkee county councillor Pat Keane to remove the proposal for a bypass linking the Carrigaholt Road with the Kilrush Road in Kilkee is unlikely to happen soon. The proposal is contained in the current West Clare Local Area Plan and was first submitted to the 2003 plan.
Councillor Keane told last week’s Kilrush Electoral Area meeting that Clare County Council should ditch the proposal and allow the land in question to be used for alternative purposes.
“It’s unfair to a person that their land is tied up. The main question is, will this ever be done? My view and the view of the people of Kilkee is that it will never be and that it shouldn’t be done,” Councillor Keane said of the bypass in Kilkee.
He said traffic heading West of Kilkee should have to pass through the town to be of economic benefit.
“If anybody is going West to the Loop Head Lighthouse, you need to bring them through the town so that you can tap into whatever monies they have to spend. What I would be proposing is that we pass this on to Kilkee Town Council because it came up recently at a meeting there. The point I’m making is we’re holding up land that there will never be a road put on,” he added.
Mayor of Kilkee Elaine Haugh Hayes also attended the meeting and concurred with the motion.
“I don’t believe that for a small town like Kilkee, diverting traffic around it is of any benefit at all. I believe traffic going through Kilkee is a better benefit to businesses. I don’t think this is ever going to happen anyway. I don’t think the money will ever be allocated,” the town mayor predicted.
Director of services Nora Kaye reminded the six West Clare area councillors that they had made some changes to the West Clare Local Area Plan on Monday, November 7.
“Just to remind councillors, last Monday you made your decision in relation to the West Clare Local Area Plan. It didn’t include that this road be excluded from the local area plan. So if in some months to come there is a strong desire to have it removed, it would have to be done by way of variation of the local area plan,” Ms Kaye explained.
Cyril Feeney, senior executive engineer told the meeting the proposed project is one of just six specifically identified in the 2011 Clare County Development Plan for future development.
He said while the money isn’t there at the moment to fund the project, even were it to go ahead, the engineer recommended that plans for the ring road would remain in place, “in the interests of the long-term development of Kilkee”.