Traffic review for Crescent and Ballymahon Road area

Athlone-Moate Municipal District Engineer Willie Ryan has pledged to have a “forensic look” at the sequencing of traffic lights at the busy Crescent junction in Athlone after two councillors shone a spotlight on the area, albeit from differing perspectives.

Fianna Fáil's Aengus O'Rourke put down a motion at Monday's monthly council meeting asking the council to consider all options to alleviate what he described as “worsening traffic congestion” along the Ballymahon Road, while Green Party Cllr Louise Heavin urged the local authority to reprogramme the pedestrian lights to ensure walkers can cross when traffic is not moving at The Crescent, having become caught there several times herself.

She also appealed for the design of the area to be transformed to prioritise pedestrians and cyclists in the upgrade of the urban realm in the area.

Mr Ryan, and a written reply from the executive, backed up this suggestion, saying “appropriate measures” will be considered as part of the assessment of the Ballymahon Road which is a primary access to Athlone, with a view to “improving safety, infrastructure and public transport on the route”, thereby supporting the transition to enhanced Active Travel.

Earlier, Cllr O'Rourke said he travels along the Ballymahon Road several times a day from either school, work and deliveries, and he has seen the road “backed up to God knows where”, while a journey on a Bank Holiday or late at night could be a straight run, with no one around.

While he conceded that there will be traffic in a busy town made up of 19,000 workers, 14,000 resident and 5,000 coming in from elsewhere to work here, he maintained that now is the time to look at The Crescent at how the lights are managed. Congestion is getting more and more frequent and often when motorists clear the Crescent junction there is no traffic ahead, an opinion his party colleague Mayor Cllr Vinny McCormack was in complete agreement with.

Cllr O'Rourke told the meeting that he believes there is capacity there to open up the traffic lights, asking the engineer to look at the sequencing, analyse the data and how they are set up.

Supporting the motion, Mayor Cllr Vinny McCormack, who lives in Ballymore, agreed that congestion along the Ballymahon Road is a problem. He explained that if he doesn't hit Tinkers Cross before 8.25am each morning, it will be 9.10am before he arrives town and parks up. This leaves him in a situation that he travels 15km in 15 minutes and it could be 40 minutes for the remaining three to four kilometres to get to where he parks in town.

Elsewhere, Green Louise Heavin said the issue for her, and maybe this was linked to old programming of lights, was that cars were stopped but pedestrians were also unable to travel because the pedestrian lights are red also.

She said this a “basic thing to be looked at” along with the design of the junction for the pedestrians, adding that there are a lot of railings and it is a “negative space” for walkers and motorists. She wondered if the design could be upgraded or included in the Railway Field project.

On the Ballymahon Road, she was frustrated that there is no sign of an area-based transport assessment, saying the whole road needed to be reassessed and redesigned, saying it was very difficult to cycle along it and as vehicles moved closer to town, traffic should be slowed down.

Cllr Frankie Keena pointed out that as one of the main arteries into town, the road should be considered for the Active Travel Scheme funding to encourage cycling. However, he said, unlike the situation in Mullingar, the plans for Athlone were not ready to access funding. He suggested that park and ride buses for people to travel the final five or six kilometres into town should be examined to tackle congestion, a view shared by Fine Gael's John Dolan.

Willie Ryan, the Athlone Moate Municipal District Engineer, said there is a “delicate balance” to be struck with the competing motions, adding that they will try to relook at the lights sequence to maximise it for pedestrians and motorists as much as possible. The Athlone Area Transport Assessment which examines all transport issues in Athlone is “nearly there” and the Ballymahon Road in its entirety is “high priority” for the Active Travel Scheme, he added.