Could well be, in that case they should only be closed across the greenway when cattle are being moved. And opened immediately afterwards. Hard to tell from photo, maybe that's what was happening?
Exactly. This made national media but what is the full story?
Are the gates padlocked or can anybody just open and close them?
Are they opened again?
No such thing as bad publicity I suppose!
This is the tweet I saw about it. It is completely unnecessary to use wire like that to keep the crossing open, and the Kerryman reported that gardai were called
That's quite deliberate then and without a few tools nobody can open the gate.
The council should just remove those gates completely.
A few belts of your boot on the gate should make the wire snap.
Are they not there for a reason though?
Sounds to me like not all grievances were sorted out, half-arsed job by KCC?
The shooting bolt is closed though and the wire is heavy gauge, a few tools might be needed IMO.
Kerry cc probably thought everything was done properly but yer man may have taken exception to it once he saw people cycling past.
If I were to find a gate like that, I'd happily repay the ignorant arsehole in kind by wiring the gate closed in the other position.
In any case, seems I'll be packing a heavy-duty pliers on any greenway excursion for the foreseeable..!
RTE reporting that the Gate was removed by the council but put back again on Sunday. I hope they can sort it out quickly.
If it was a public road being blocked, the full force of the law would be brought down very quickly. Be interesting to see how long this takes to sort out.
I think this is a misunderstanding by the person reporting it. These gates have been erected by KCC along the greenway where there was a crossing on the railway line. I very much doubt the gate was removed and replaced.
In this pic, you can see the new gates, and the original older gates outside them.
That was my thinking. Open them and wire them in the other position see how he likes it.
From what I gather its a different section to this one.
Different section but the gates are the same the whole way along
Not for the first time journalists don't bother researching the subject properly.
All the gates were installed to allow animals to cross.
No farmer has installed a gate overnight, just secured them with wire to stop people returning them to their home position.
Conflating and confusing two different sets of gates, local newspaper hacks take a bow.
It seems she is reading the forum 😂 The article is updated to read
Council staff were alerted and untied the gates, but they had to return again on Sunday when the two were locked together once more.
That crap was going on for years on the Limerick greenway between Rathkeale and Ardagh, where the trail used to pass through a farmyard, farmer kept tying the gates for cattle crossing and never bothering his hole to re-open them. He eventually got his way when the whole greenway had to be diverted in a big semi circle around his farm when it was resurfaced in recent years, much to the annoyance of the original voluntary group who maintained the trail.
Not being smart if a farmer has used this right of way for years what precedent happens if he keeps using it like milking cows might be crossing 4 or more times a day .If the gates are crossing the greenway should the people using the greenway open them and when they pass trough close them crossing the greenway for the animals to pass
Would you trust the general public to religiously close gates after them?? They can't even obey regulations in public places and parks, lol. Unless it's a self-closing type of gate, but then cyclists will moan and one or other party will jam them open or closed for their own convenience.
A better move would have been to provide an underpass for him. Making big avoiding routes around holdouts defeats the point of a greenway as a reasonably linear route.
Do you think the farmer would pay for the construction of a underpass on land that is publicly owned, that he has no divine right of access to?
You might not like it and it may not be morally right but are you confident that you can beat him if you brought him to court?
And who's going to do it? You? CIE and a Property Dept that operates at a glacial pace, even if they cared? The Council? This local group who probably don't have a brass farthing between them? Either way it would cost money.
Welcome to Ireland, enjoy your stay.
Of course it would hold up in court and it will be the Dept of Transport and KCC doing anything about it. The land was divested from CIE to KCC years ago, closing access is the same type of passive agressive behaviour as piling mounds of dirt on the line to stop groups walking it.
will need to pack this 😀
So someone is using a right of way crossing the railway line with the last 50 years should have no right to open a gate provided in your argument .Right of way law is not as black and white as you make off !!
I don't think anyone has any issue with any farmer using the gates to allow animals to cross from one field to another. It is an entirely seperate issue than locking the gate in an open position.
So will there be a timeframe put on the farmer so for locking the gate in a open position to move his animals .I am not a solicitor but surely something can be ironed out
In most instances a farmer won't be moving animals across a greenway / railway / public road too often.
There is a farm near me and they bring cows across the public road for milking, takes about 5 minutes.
Does anybody know the exact location of this house? I had a scan of google maps but its not obvious?
If they are genuinely milking cows then an underpass could have been considered, it would only need to have been sufficient for cows not vehicles so inexpensive.
It looks to me like the crossing is to access the house itself.
In which case they wouldnt need a gate at all.
It looks like the court took care of the problem pretty quickly anyway
