Bollards on new Wexford town one-way system will eventually be removed – ‘They were never intended to be permanent’
Wexford PeopleThe senior engineer for the Wexford Borough has said she has received no official correspondence from the National Ambulance Service (NAS) regarding the new one-way system at John Street. This follows on from comments made by Cllr Ger Carthy at last week’s county council meeting in which he said ambulances were struggling to navigate the new system on their way to the nearby hospital.
Cllr Carthy, who is an operations resource manager for the NAS, also expressed his disappointment that his colleagues in the Borough District had “allowed” the potential issues at John St to happen without intervening.
However, at the September meeting of the Wexford Borough District, senior engineer Eilis Furlong said she had yet to hear anything from the NAS.
“There has to be a protocol for the emergency services if they have an issue, we don’t need to hear it in the council chamber,” replied Cllr Biddy Walsh. “That’s not the way we should be doing our business. And we know exactly how to run our district. If there’s a problem with the emergency services we need to hear it directly from them.”
While she has met with business owners in the area to discuss their concerns, Ms Furlong accepted that the bollards on John St would continue to be a source of frustration for motorists until they were removed. Confirming that they were only a temporary measure, she said they had been installed in an effort to correct driver behaviour.
“The reality is if the bollards weren’t there people would either turn down the one-way systems or they would park in those areas, they are only temporary, they were never intended to be a permanent solution,” she said. “Not everyone is in favour of the one-way system, you’re never going to get universal approval but from my perspective it does seem to be working quite well, there have been times when there’s been a backlog of traffic but that happens everywhere in town.”