'It’s just going to make roads less safe': Councillors concerned at impact of upcoming reduced speed limits

Reduced speed limits on some national routes to be introduced later this year could actually lead to more head on road collisions and would also have a negative impact on tourism, haulage, and the driving times of people travelling from West Cork to the city for work, councillors attending Monday’s meeting of Cork County Council heard.

West Cork Independent councillor Finbarr Harrington called for a reconsideration of the proposal to reduce the speed limit on national secondary roads from 100kmh to 80kmh.

“For example the main road to West Cork, Clonakilty, Skibbereen and on to Bantry, it is proposed that will reduce from 100kmh to 80kmh later this year and what we’re being told is that our regional roads are safe,” said Mr Harrington.

“That will do two things. Obviously it will make peoples’ journeys longer and frustrate people, it will also divert a lot of traffic, where it’s possible for traffic to travel on regional roads.

“It will make our regional roads much busier, they will effectively have to be reduced as well.

“This will have a massive negative impact on our tourism, it will have a big impact on haulage companies, drivers and tachographs and all that — for every hour and a half they’re travelling, it will add around half an hour extra onto their journey."

Mr Harrington called on the Minister of Transport, Darragh O’Brien, to defer the implementation of this reduced limit until an impact assessment of the measure would be carried out. He said that the impact on peripheral regions, far away from the city, needed to be considered.

In the debate that followed this proposal, councillors took the opportunity to welcome the introduction of the reduced speed limit on local roads, the reduction of 80kmh to 60kmh, which came into effect on Friday of last week, but expressed concern that the latest proposal could have a negative impact on road safety.

Peter O’Donoghue, the Independent councillor representing the Fermoy Municipal District, said the speed limit reduction on narrow local roads made perfect sense for safety issues.

“Reducing large wide secondary roads from 100 down to 80 makes absolutely no sense,” he said.

“This is about safety, apparently, in my opinion this is going to make these roads less safe and more dangerous.

“It’s going to create more frustration, more overtaking, it’s just going to make roads less safe.”