Impressed Fianna Fail leader meets Drogheda City status campaigners
THE Drogheda City Status Committee returned to Leinster House last week at the invitation of Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin T.D. to address him on its campaign.
The Committee made a detailed presentation, emphasising Drogheda’s large and expanding population, its position on major transport hubs like the M1 motorway and the Dublin-Belfast rail line, its entrepreneurial spirit and young, well-educated population, and its proximity to major infrastructural hubs like Dublin airport and Dublin port.
It pointed out its enormous tourist potential and the success of the Fleadh this year in attracting nearly half a million visitors to the town.
The Committee pointed out that Drogheda’s ability to attract investment, plan development properly and develop its tourist industry was being stifled by the fact that it straddles different county and administrative boundaries, and it urged that this be eliminated, enabling the town and the surrounding area to be looked at as a whole where decisions on such matters were concerned.
“I’m very grateful to Micheál Martin for giving us an afternoon to talk to him on this matter. The Committee made a passionate, powerful and persuasive case to him, clearly showing how Drogheda’s growth has been hampered and what needs to be done to unleash its potential. He listened positively to what we had to say and is clearly deeply interested in the matter,’ Anthony Moore, who helped to organise the meeting, explained.
‘As a long-standing Fianna Fáil member from Drogheda, I am absolutely delighted that the Drogheda City Status Campaign is now on the agenda at the highest levels of the Fianna Fáil party. When Drogheda finally gets the city status it deserves, there is no doubt in my mind that we will look back on this day as a historic occasion”.