Wexford council searches for utopia as Mayor says houses are being built without sufficient services in place
Wexford PeopleA proposal that schools, bus services, and healthcare facilities be built “in tandem” with new housing developments in Co Wexford has been described as “utopian” by Councillor Paddy Kavanagh.
He was responding to a motion submitted by Mayor of Wexford Vicky Barron in which she highlighted the lack of facilities in place for residents in large developments such as Ballynagee in Killeens.
Speaking at the monthly meeting of Wexford County Council (WCC), Mayor Barron said a “strengthened, infrastructure-first approach to residential development” was required in the county, one which would see the provision of “schools, childcare facilities, public and active travel infrastructure, community facilities, open spaces, healthcare, and other essential services” integrated into the development of new residential areas.
“We need to make sure there are enough school places in proximity of the children living in the new estates in Ballynagee,” said the Mayor. “The houses there aren’t serviced by public transport, and when it’s raining children are not coming to school. They are in danger of dropping out.
“We’re going to have an additional one million houses built across the county, we need to have the infrastructures in place for those people.”
But Cllr Kavanagh advised the Mayor to temper her expectations.
“It sounds utopian, it’s an ideal solution which is never going to happen,” he said of her motion. “We don’t know how many children are going to be born in a housing estate, we can’t predict the future.
A map of the masterplan for Ballynagee.
“If we knew what was going to happen down the line then we could plan for it, but we don’t.”
However, Gorey councillor Darragh McDonald defended the Mayor’s proposal.
“It’s unfair to call it a utopia, there are certain assumptions you can make when carrying out a statistical survey of a population - if there are a thousand houses there is going to be a certain amount of children. It’s not guess work,” he said.
This was supported by chief executive Eddie Taaffe who said every aspect of the county’s growth was examined by his planning department.
“It’s quite correct what’s being outlined in the motion. Our towns aren’t developing by chance, we have a forward planning team looking at these things, examining the projected increased populations.
“People want all this infrastructure delivered and then the houses afterwards, but we need to plan so we know where the infrastructure should be built, and then we can do so in tandem with the housing.
“I would be confident that we are well-placed to deal with the issues raised here, we’ll never reach utopia, but we’ll give it a good try.”
Following the chief executive’s comments the motion was passed unanimously.