Residents unite to push for Dublin Road link up
RESIDENTS of Five Oaks and Deepforde have expressed their fears that the lack of footpath between the two estates will lead to tragedy.
At present, the footpath on the Dublin Road stops dead at the Meath boundary between the two estates, forcing families and children to cross an extremely busy road to access the path on the opposite side.
While Meath County Council (MCC) has completed the footpath from the Deepforde estate as far as the Southgate Roundabout, Louth County Council (LCC) has said it has ‘no plans’ to provide a footpath on the Louth side running as far as the Five Oaks estate. One of the reasons given was that the footpath would ‘service mainly the households resident in County Meath’. Emily Hodgins from the Five Oaks Resident’s Association said: ‘A huge portion of the population in the estate, myself included, would use this stretch of the road. Children, dog walkers and shoppers. It’s the only portion of the Dublin Road that isn’t paved so I don’t understand it.’
She said one of the conditions of the planning permission for Five Oaks was that a contribution of €67,000 was required to be paid by the developer towards the cost of footpaths. Chairperson of the Deepforde Residents Association (DRA), Ciaran Leddy said: ‘We’re all part of Drogheda, we’ve got Southgate Shopping Centre on the Meath side, Five Oaks on the Louth side but the very fact there is no footpath linking up the two means that local residents are being put at risk in an area that is an accident black spot.
‘I was speaking to my own nineyear-old daughter about it who said herself and her Mum have to run across the road every morning on the way to school to avoid the cars. That to me just brings home how dangerous it is. ‘ Aaron O’Neill, Treasurer of the DRA, added: ‘At the end of the day this is a safety issue for the residents of Drogheda, those who live in both Louth and Meath. The Meath part of the footpath is in place. Louth now needs to do its part to ensure no children’s lives are lost before someone agrees to take action.