Irish water to spend €500k to fix ageing Kilworth pipes

THE confirmation that Irish Water is set to replace 4km of ageing mains pipes in the Kilworth area is set to finally bring to an end a long-running impasse between the company and local residents.

Irish Water this week announced it was to provide a “more secure and reliable” water supply for houses in Castlecooke and the surrounding area by replacing the old and damaged pipes with a new connection from nearby Macroney.

The company said there had been frequent outages on the Castlecooke supply to the aged network, with an average of almost one burst pipe per month over recent years.

In order to address this, the existing supply from Castlecooke will be replaced with a new connection to the Macroney scheme by 4km of new mains at a cost of almost €500,000. The work is set to get underway early this month and will take approximately four months to complete.

Paul Cremin, capital programmes lead with Irish Water, said the work would ensure a secure water supply to local households and protect against future outages due to busts pipes and other issues.

“People on Castlecooke have been experiencing outages due to frequent burst to the ageing pipes. We plan to address this and are pleased to be moving forward with this essential project which will lead to a much improved local water supply,” said Mr Cremin.

“Irish Water will work with Cork County Council and our contractors to ensure disruption to residents and road users during the ongoing works are kept to a minimum,” he added.

The move brings to an end an almost two-year dispute between Castlecooke residents and Irish Water, sparked by a proposal by the company to switch local houses to the ‘ hard’ water Downing Bridge source.

The issue had been raised as far back as July 2016 by Cllr Deirdre O’Brien (FF), who had pointed out that water from Downing Bridge supply was as much as four times harder than that currently being used.

She said locals were concerned that switching to the Downing Bridge supply could cost them thousands of Euro to replace damaged household and farming equipment.

Incensed residents even went as far as signing a petition calling on Irish Water not to go ahead with the switch, claiming they had not even been consulted about the move.

“They want to stay where they are. There should be no question of their supply being changed against their will,” she told Council officials.

At the time Cllr Frank O’Flynn (FF) said that locals would rather dig their own wells than be switched to the ‘ hard’ Downing Bridge supply.

Cllr O’Brien welcomed the news that the existing supply from Macroney was to be upgraded. “The local community stood their ground. This is a victory for common sense and people power ,” she said.