Cork’s roads left in “appalling state” by utility companies

By Peter McCarthy, Corkman

Shoddy, substandard and appalling – some of the words used by Cork county councillors to describe the repairs to roads in their areas after utility companies like Uisce Éireann and Eir have dug them up.

At this week’s meeting of the council, Cllr Deirdre O’Brien put down a motion calling on the local authority to write to utility providers and service contractors, expressing dissatisfaction with the quality of reinstatement works on the county’s roads.

Cllr O’Brien said that the works “are nothing short of appalling in places.” She described Uisce Éireann as “the bane of our lives”, while Eir and National Broadband Ireland “are just absolutely appalling, the mess they’re leaving after them”.

The Fermoy councillor said the reinstatement works are often substandard, poorly finished and “in many cases an outright hazard”.

"Lumps of tar literally thrown around, potholes, dykes pulled out and, in some cases, trees cut into limbs left in drains, which leads to blocking the drains later on.”

She said the work “compromises the structural integrity of our roads, it accelerates deterioration, it poses risks to our drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians, and shows disregard for the public realm that we all share a duty to protect”.

There was widespread agreement among the other councillors present. Cllr Dominic Finn said that if contractors “can get away with it, they'll chance it and they'll leave some of the reinstatement of the verges and the roads not done”.

Cllr Sheila O’Callaghan said that the main street in Watergrasshill “had 50 shades of grey from all the different people who had hacked at it and laid different surfaces, which makes it very unsightly”.

In North Cork there are so many roads that had been looked after by our engineers and then wrecked by some other agency that has come in and left them in an appalling state,” said Cllr Kay Dawson.

Cllr Patrick Donovan said that “in Carrigaline we're waiting over 18 months for Irish Water to come back into an estate to patch up an area they took up” while Cllr Audrey Buckley said she’s been waiting over four years for Eir to fix inspection covers on a footpath in Crosshaven that’s part of the Safe Routes to School scheme.

Cork County Council Divisional Manager Niall Healy told the meeting that the local authority received over 5,000 applications for road opening licences last year. Uisce Éireann made up over 60 per cent, Eir 17 per cent, National Broadband Ireland 14 per cent and the remainder were ESB Networks and private contractors.

He said that the conditions included within the licence require that the road be reinstated to the standard in which it was before the works were carried out.

“There are two issues that we monitor very closely. One is the timeliness, the other is the quality of the work that's carried out.

“We've had an issue with Uisce Éireann over the last two to three years where temporary reinstatements were being done, but they weren't being followed through with permanent reinstatements. So there was a legacy backlog right across the county in relation to Uisce ireann works,” he continued.

Mr Healy added that the council has had several meetings with the national water utility and the situation has “improved enormously”.

"You may have seen blitzes by Uisce Eireann across the county where they've moved into particular geographic areas and they've done a lot of permanent reinstatements.”

He concluded that the situation “should be an improving one” but the council is conscious that there are issues out there and they are being monitored.