It'll cost €1m to alter a €3m Kildare road 'which caused pedestrian accidents'
The project was criticised because of the number of accidental trips and falls
The cost of repairing a road, which was criticised for the amount of accidents taking place there, will come to €1m.
That’s according to Fine Gael councillor Evie Sammon, who said the bill for the original project, before claims of accidents taking place emerged, came to €3m.
A previous estimate of the cost of the original works was €5m.
The project created new cycle lanes and footpaths at Kilcullen Road in Naas.
However, the project was criticised by local politicians including Cllr Sammon who previously claimed that the number of accidents had exceeded the six acknowledged by Kildare County Council.
Cllr Sammon said the review by consultants "confirmed what we (the councillors) had been saying" and the cycle lanes needed to be painted red.
Naas mayor Seamie Moore said that pedestrians cannot differentiate between the road and the kerb and “a lot of accidents are happening.” He said different colours need to be used to deal with this problem.
KCC was asked by Cllr Fintan Brett at a Naas Municipal District meeting to suspend the installation of cycleways and pedestrian infrastructure works across the Naas area pending a design review “following multiple accidents in areas where works are completed.”
Referring to the fact that the National Transport Authority was responsible for the design, Cllr Carmel Kelly said an NTA representative should attend a municipal district meeting because the authority has questions to answer.
KCC engineer Chris Galvin said these schemes are designed “in accordance with national design standards and road safety audit procedures (and) where issues are identified through construction and post construction, measures are put in place to remedy them.”
Mr Galvin said some projects, notably in urban areas, are constrained because of the location.
He said recommendations had been made for the Kilcullen Road scheme and these are being implemented.
He also said that that design is a few years old and newer designs take account of what has been learned since then.