Republican News · Thursday 9 December 1999

[An Phoblacht]

Road war in Sligo

City residents and councillors battle four-lane highway

BY ROISIN DE ROSA

``We stopped them blocking up these houses. With my bare hands I removed the concrete and blocks. It's a fight we're not going to let up on,'' says Gabrielle Finan, a slim built lady of striking determination and a member of Sligo's Concerned Citizens Action Group (CCAGS).

The group is fighting for the retention of their houses and their community against a 30-year-old Sligo Corporation plan to slap a national primary road through their streets.

``For 30 years we've been living under the threat of this hammer falling on our heads, that the so called Mid Block Route, a four-lane highway proposed to relieve Sligo's traffic congestion, will get the go ahead. The road will cut the city in two and, a CCAGS report points out, ``will necessitate demolition/destruction of some 40 well built, lovely old houses where people have lived for generations, 27 commercial properties and 42 offices, gardens etc.''

Decision time

Dispute over the Mid Block Route proposal has gone on over the years. What has changed things now is the newly elected Corporation, with its three Sinn Féin councillors. The majority of councillors are now opposed to the Mid Block Route.

Compulsory Purchase Orders (CPOs) on houses began in the 1980s. Without so much as a word from Corporation officials, residents saw their houses listed `for demolition' in local newspapers. The CCAG filed a complaint to Brussels, and in 1993, the then Minister for the Environment, Michael Smith, refused to authorise the road and ordered the Corporation to undertake a further environmental impact study.

The CCAG found the new study to be seriously flawed and made further complaints, and finally the Corporation commissioned another report from leading planning experts at UCD, the `2020 A Vision Strategy'. This November 1998 report came down against the Mid Block Route.

Opponents of the road claim a cover up by the Corporation. The report apparently was not disclosed until it was leaked to the press, just before a sworn public inquiry was to begin last June.

Acting Sligo Town Clerk John O'Dwyer says that the corporation has not received the report of this sworn public inquiry yet, though it finished over four months ago. A spokesperson for the Department of the Environment agrees that it's a bit strange that the report is not yet available, but ``they expect it within the next two weeks''.

The decision on the road now rests with Minister for the Environment, Noel Dempsey, along with authorisation for Compulsory Purchase Orders on a further 12 houses, which would have to go if the road went ahead. Whatever decision the minister may reach, however, it is enabling but not compelling. The proposed road cannot go ahead against the decision of the councillors.

`Hammer over the houses'

May Carey explains what it has meant to people who live in this John's Street area, beside the planned route. ``We've not been able to do anything with our houses. We wanted to put in a bathroom, people needed new roofs, we couldn't do it. We were waiting. My neighbour, who is 80 years old, wanted to put in central heating. `Do nothing with your houses', the Corporation said.'' May's family have been in their house since the start of the century in 1904. ``We're not going to give it up now.''

Argument over the road turns on whether the large proportion of traffic ends in Sligo or is through traffic on what is a national route, the N4, and a trans-Europe link from the South West to Belfast. Damien Tansey, solicitor for the Action Group, draws on evidence to suggest that 80 per cent of the traffic is through traffic.

``The Mid Block route meets none of the transport targets outlined in the Operational Programme for Transport 1994-1999 as requirements for strategic corridors, or a trans-European link. Times have moved on from when the plan was first mooted, and away from inner relief routes in favour of a bypass of the town.''

Mid-Block-Route only temporary

``There is a plan for a Western bypass to be built within the next ten years. The proposed route goes between the city and the harbour. The Mid Block Route is only a temporary relief measure for the N4 traffic, so why build it at all?'' asks Sinn Féin Councillor Chris MacManus. Sligo Corporation has asked Minister Dempsey for immediate go ahead for the city by-pass and a halt to the Mid-Block-Route proposal.

According to City Engineer Gerry Cannon, so far 22 houses have already been acquired through CPO and a further 12 CPOs are waiting with the Minister for authorisation. Councillor MacManus points out that in the context of Sligo's chronic housing problem, with 506 on the housing list, it is criminal to demolish good houses to build a temporary four-lane highway through a residential area where people have lived for years. We should simply expedite building the city by-pass.''

Manager Threatens legal action

Matters have come to a head at the two last council meetings, where County and City Manager Hubert Kearns asked the councillors to authorise opening the tenders submitted for demolition work on Union Street properties, which have been bought by compulsory purchase order by the Corporation. Twice the councillors have refused.

The manager has branded their action unlawful and has threatened unspecified legal action against the councillors. Acting Town Clerk John O'Dwyer says that the ``demolition work has nothing to do with the building of the Mid Block Route''. He says it relates largely to warehousing and back yards of residential property.

Sinn Féin Alderman Sean MacManus says, however, that he considers the demolition work, if allowed, would be used as another lever to push through the road.


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