Minor schemes & realignments

I contacted the local office regarding the minor N63 works. They are removing a dip in the road and doing a basic resurface of c. 2km or road. No addition of a cycleway or any path of any description.

Disappointing but hardly surprising. God forbid I might have expected that roadworks on Primary roads in 2022 would add a pathway for cyclists and pedestrians.

Yeah for sure.

They have upgraded others sections of the road nearby. 6km from M17 to Abbeyknockmoy - although this was within the funding for the motorway - and they also upgraded a 700m section outside Moylough - below.

I was hoping this was the same as the current works, but alas it's not.

The road is national secondary indeed. Once you get into Roscommon though, large sections of the road are already close to Primary standard with hard shoulder etc though no cycleway! Shame they can't gradually upgrade as per the image below.

Does anyone have any drawings or maps of the Tralee Northern Relief Road which is currently under construction? Oddly, Kerry County Council have none that I'm aware of on their website and a Google search doesn't deliver any meaningful results either. I'm curious to see how much it deviates from the existing narrow road between N69 Forge Cross roundabout and Abbeydorney Road and where the tie in/new roundabout on the latter road will be located.

The Minister for Transport defines what roads are National roads and the function of the road defines whether it’s primary or secondary.

National Roads are a network that enables long-distance travel between towns and cities as well as sea-ports and airports. They are managed, funded and planned directly by TII and the Department of Transport.

The two sub-categories, Primary and Secondary are to do with the importance of the road nationally. Primary roads (numbers 1–50) go between major cities and nationally important sites, and normally end within a major settlement. Secondary roads (numbers 51–99) connect smaller places to the primary network, and normally terminate on a primary road at both ends (but there are a couple of exceptions: N68 terminates in Dingle, for instance).

All of the motorways are also national roads (legally the M50 is National Road 50, even though it was built as a motorway from day one), but that’s because only the most important cross-country routes have been built out as motorways, and those were all national roads. There's nothing in the legislation that would prevent a Regional Road being placed under motorway regulations, but it’s unlikely to happen now given the focus on reducing car commuting.

The last categories, Regional (R prefix, numbers 100–999) and Local (L prefix, numbers above 1000, and the numbers can be re-used in different counties) are managed by the county and city councils. Regional roads are medium-distance, usually within one county, and connect places within the region (hence the name); Local roads connect individual properties and small villages.

Ach. Fat fingers.

The N51 is getting a minor upgrade in navan with a tender gone out for a local distributor road connecting the N51 at Teagasc rounabout across the blackwater and back to the slane road.

Maybe because its not TII funded they had to split the contract for funding purposes and there may be a 2nd contract coming out for the connection piece

Any idea who the contractor is?

Construction of the site compound for the N60 Heathlawn project is to start this week, according to Mayo County Council. The new contractor is not wasting any time!

According to Mayo Co Co, the tender has been awarded for the N84 north of Shrule road widening scheme, with the contractor scheduled to commence by end November.

Same guys who did N17 Carrownurlaur to Ballindine and the N60 at Lagnamuck, both grand jobs.