Laghey to Pettigo (R232)

betistuc

Hopeful news today for everyone in South Donegal, who uses this glorified boreen en route to and from Dublin. I include myself as one of the long suffering. I've been complaining about the state of this road for thirty years and all I hear is " they can do nothing with it. It's built on a bog. It's a regional road so won't get any major funding" The traffic on this road can be mind boggling sometimes with Lorries and coaches dicing for road space and sometimes ending up ditched. I don't exaggerate, talk to anyone from up this way
A newly arrived Counciller in Donegal has decided to make this road one of his projects. I welcome his efforts.

From the front page ofthe Donegal Post 13/09/2017

Donegal’s newest councillor has called for a significant change of status for the notorious Laghey to Pettigo road.
Cllr Micheal Naughton put down the following motion at Tuesday’s meeting of the Municipal District (MD) of Donegal: “That this Municipal District seeks calls for Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) to upgrade the Regional Road which is the R232 Pettigo to Laghey from a Regional to a National Secondary Road.”
Cllr Naughton said that this road was a major artery used by heavy goods vehicles (HGVs), local motorists and tourists.
“Killybegs is one of the busiest fishing ports in the country,” he said. “All the lorries leaving from Killybegs use this road.
“It also serves visitors coming in from Fermanagh and Tyrone. You have a lot of people coming from that part of Northern Ireland who are going to Rossnowlagh and right through the area, down as far as Glencolmcille.
“And people living in this part of Donegal and up as far as Glenties, Ardara and Dungloe would use this road to go to Dublin or Belfast.”
The councillor pointed out that motorists often find themselves stuck behind HGVs for the entire length of the road. He said it was also a road on which there were a high number of collisions.
Cllr Barry O’Neill seconded the motion, saying he would fully support and assist Cllr Naughton on the matter.
“Donegal County Council has spent millions on this road, trying to get it up to standard," said Cllr O'Neill. "Year after year, there are hundreds of thousands of Euro spent. I am very supportive of this motion because it makes perfect sense for the TII to take responsibility for this very busy road and to invest in bringing it up to National Secondary Road standard.”
Impact

However, concerns were raised about the impact of such a move.
Cllr John Campbell said: “Changing it from a Regional to National Secondary Road would have a big impact on development. That is something we need to think a bit more about before doing anything.”
Area Roads Officer Mark Sweeney confirmed that it would greatly impact on any planning permission that involved access on to the road.
Cllr O’Neill replied: “A comparison would be the Ballyshannon to Belleek road where the same thing happened. It hasn’t done any harm there at all. The positives outweigh the negatives.”
Cllr Naughton added: “A lot of the Pettigo to Laghey road is basically bog so there would be no development on 80% to 90% of it. Given the amount of traffic, I believe it should be upgraded.”
The motion was accepted by councillors.
Mr Sweeney said he would therefore begin discussions with the TII.

marno21

The signed route from Donegal town to Dublin would be via Ballyshannon -> Belleek (N3) or Sligo (N4), and north Donegal can use the N14/A5.

Two national routes is more than sufficient, if anything the N3 from the Ballyshannon bypass to the border should be realigned and that's job done.

L1011

A councillor asking for something does not even begin to suggest it will happen

It's not going to be changed to a national route - if anything TII want to reduce the number of them.

betistuc

marno21 wrote: »

The signed route from Donegal town to Dublin would be via Ballyshannon -> Belleek (N3) or Sligo (N4), and north Donegal can use the N14/A5.

Two national routes is more than sufficient, if anything the N3 from the Ballyshannon bypass to the border should be realigned and that's job done.

That's as maybe Marno, but the fact remains that for decades the vast majority of south west Donegal residents use the R232 as their preferred route to Enniskillen/Cavan/Dublin. That's not going to change, unless they are pushed to go via Sligo because of future border posts.
For us, the route of Ballyshannon /Beleek is more or less doing two sides of a triangle and would'nt make sense for commuters in the this catchment. Indeed if you've ever driven that route, you'll know that from Ballyshannon to the border, it's not too bad. Once you cross the border things go downhill and the road all the way to Enniskillen (south of the lower Lough Erne) is a slow , twisty, dangerous road. Almost zero overtaking opps. This is the route Bus Eireann use on their Donegal Town - Dublin route and if you ever have the misfortune to be on this service bring a sick bag as it's akin to being on a rough sea in a small boat. After Enniskillen - things improve
Bad as the R232 is, its preferable to your suggestion and it's a shorter route to Enniskillen by about 15 mins. Also, there are one or two decent overtaking spots. Unfortunately, its prone to subsidence with all the heavy traffic on it and unless it gets an upgrade - even to national secondary - then they'll always be working on it keeping it patched up.

Kevwoody

L1011 wrote:

A councillor asking for something does not even begin to suggest it will happen

Heard a snippet of an interview this evening on Highland Radio.
The councillor is leading a 'delegation' made up of locals and members of Donegal County Council to a meeting with Shane Ross next week to discuss upgrading the road to a National Secondary Road.

L1011

Kevwoody wrote: »

Heard a snippet of an interview this evening on Highland Radio.
The councillor is leading a 'delegation' made up of locals and members of Donegal County Council to a meeting with Shane Ross next week to discuss upgrading the road to a National Secondary Road.

And it won't be.

Kevwoody

L1011 wrote:

And it won't be.

Probably not but I can see the merits of it, almost all traffic from south of the Gap use it to travel to Dublin.

L1011

In any even vaguely floppy border situation (not quite hard, etc, etc) all the money will go on the N4/N15 corridor and not a cent on anything that crosses the border.

There will never be a regional to National upgrade again either, that's fairly certain - the N3 is the National across the border for south Donegal.

Kevwoody

L1011 wrote:

There will never be a regional to National upgrade again either, that's fairly certain - the N3 is the National across the border for south Donegal.

Yea your probably right, although its my opinion that regional roads should be taken off local authorities and placed under a larger TII.
The amount of funding that local authorities waste because of high operating costs is ridiculous. Crews going out throwing cold tarmac into potholes and rolling it in with the wheel of the truck is a disgrace. I heard a figure a few years back of a 3 man crew costing almost €2000 per day when all costs are taken into account.

marno21

It would be more of an idea for the Donegal politicians to get the existing national road network done before adding more to it.

Besides the TEN-T priority improvements that likely will go ahead as part of the NDP (Ballybofey/Stranorlar, Leterkenny-Lifford & the N13/N56 Letterkenny upgrade), there are a lot of improvements to be done within the county.

L1011

There is one change, resulting in a reduction of distance, to the national secondary system that is needed in Donegal.

The N56 needs to be put over the R262. Improve the replacement R road towards Killybegs also but the remaining section towards Ardara has no importance.

If the fishing industry continues dying on its arse as appears to be the EU decision, Dungloe will only continue to grow as the sole economic centre for the NW of the county and forcing traffic miles out of the way for no reason isn't going to help.

It has the shops, the banks and the jobs (Randox)

marno21

L1011 wrote: »

There is one change, resulting in a reduction of distance, to the national secondary system that is needed in Donegal.

The N56 needs to be put over the R262. Improve the replacement R road towards Killybegs also but the remaining section towards Ardara has no importance.

If the fishing industry continues dying on its arse as appears to be the EU decision, Dungloe will only continue to grow as the sole economic centre for the NW of the county and forcing traffic miles out of the way for no reason isn't going to help.

It has the shops, the banks and the jobs (Randox)

I can see this being an option after Donegal County Council have pushed through the N56 Inver-Killybegs scheme. Mountcharles-Inver should be done by 2020 or so.

It makes sense given the R262 being a more direct/sensible route and the fact that the N56 doesn't even go to Killybegs.

Has any work been done on the R262? It will be a poor stretch sandwiched in between the two N56 upgrade schemes in a few years time.

enricoh

Great road for rallying on though! How the artic driver's cope is beyond me!

Donegal Storm

marno21 wrote: »

Has any work been done on the R262? It will be a poor stretch sandwiched in between the two N56 upgrade schemes in a few years time.

A small stretch in the middle that was literally falling apart was resurfaced last year but considering its the de facto main national route for the whole of west and NW Donegal its still a horribly inadequate route full of sharp bends and narrow carriageway


As for the Pettigo route, I don't see the point of upgrading it really, with N4 south of Colooney pegged to start construction this year and with Longford - Mullingar (and hopefully a Carrick bypass) in the development plan, focusing on a Donegal Town to Sligo upgrade would be far more sensible for DCC

L1011

There were some big enough rebuilds on it in the 1990s using the extremely unreliable bog squashing system so those sections are now like a rollercoaster.

What is meant by bog squashing system ?

D Trent

salonfire wrote: »

What is meant by bog squashing system ?

Think of fudge packing - it's a similar idea

L1011

Cover the future road bed with plastic, pierce with pipes. Cover with stones. Keep adding more stones as it sinks. This should force the water out of the bog below and give a foundation.


It doesn't work properly though