Progress on road safety plans for Coralstown NS
Issues about road safety concerns outside schools are a perennial problem discussed by members of the Mullingar Kinnegad Municipal District, but one school is in the process of having the matter addressed.
The problem is experienced by both urban and rural schools, but staff at Coralstown National School have in the past found it necessary to direct traffic on the road outside the school. Now following representation by local elected members on behalf of the school (see separate story), measures are to be implemented to address the difficulty.
“This has been a long-standing problem, even before I was a principal here,” Michael Ward told the Westmeath Examiner last week. “My predecessor, Mary Daly, did work on it as part of the Green-Schools programme.”
The local authority and An Taisce have now come up with a plan under the The Safe Routes to School programme: “I’m going into my third year as principal here. We met with An Taisce and they have put forward, in conjunction with Westmeath County Council, a plan for the road. The chairperson of the board of management, Fr Tom, and myself have now agreed upon that plan. The next step now is that the parents association will be meeting with Susan Doorley of An Taisce,” Mr Ward said.
Ms Doorley, An Taisce infrastructure officer, will apprise the parents of the process: “She will take them through the plan, and from there it’s sent to Westmeath County Council, who will come out and do an on-site measurement.
“They will conduct an assessment for measures like pedestrian crossing, traffic calming and infrastructure.”
Mr Ward welcomed the next step: “The plan is to create a zone that we as a school will take responsibility for. People travelling on the road will know that they’re coming into a school zone. There’ll be road markings, there’ll be speed ramps and there’ll be pedestrian crossings. You can see now outside many schools the pencil bollards at the footpath edge to highlight that it is a school area.
“It’s about alerting motorists they are approaching a school zone and they need to be vigilant that there’ll be young people crossing.”
The Coralstown NS principal said there was a great deal of collaboration to progress the matter: “We’re appreciative of the work of Westmeath County Council on this project – Rachel Brown from the local authority, and Susan Doorley and Nadia Williams from An Taisce. I’d also like to mention Cllr Dennis Leonard and Cllr Emily Wallace. It’s been a real team effort.”
Mr Ward said the timeline for completion is now in place: “I’ve been told that it’ll be early 2027 at the latest by the time physically the traffic calming measures are put in place on the road.” (See related story, left.)