Councillors at odds over Westport parking plans

Councillors at odds over Westport parking plans


Áine Ryan

ON-STREET parking charges in Westport will sound ‘the death knell’ for small shops in the tourism haven, encouraging them to use the Tesco and Supervalu carparks, which are free.
That is the categorical view of Labour Party Town Councillor Keith Martin who has strongly criticised his local authority colleagues, who recently paved the way for their introduction. However, his Fine Gael colleague on the town council, Cllr Michael McLaughlin has dubbed Martin’s reaction to the proposal as ‘sensationalist’.
Cllr Martin also slammed a proposal to introduce a six-month trial period to test the controversial proposal, which has been strongly challenged by Fianna FΡil’s Cllr Brendan Mulroy too.
Last month the town council voted to adopt a provision of €150,000 revenue from on-street parking in it annual budget. A motion, proposed by Cllr Mulroy, and seconded by Cllr Martin, to defer any provision for on-street parking – until after a Traffic Management meeting was held to discuss the measures – was defeated by 6-2 votes, after the five Fine Gael councillors and Independent Cllr Martin Keane backed the inclusion of the projected parking charges in the annual budget.
This means that if the by-law was not passed, an additional €150,000 will have to be identified from the overall budget. 
“Cllr Mulroy and I have been very strong on this issue from the beginning; we are opposed to the introduction of on-street parking charges in Westport.  We wanted a proper public debate on the issue before adopting the budget but we were voted down,” Cllr Martin said.
He continued: “Despite the fact that all the Fine Gael councillors and Independent Cllr Martin Keane backed the budget provision for €150,000 in on-street parking charges, I don’t think they will back the parking by-laws as quickly.
“Grocery, butchers, florists and clothes shops are already finding it hard enough to keep their doors open without Westport Town Council driving away customers through an opportunistic parking charge.
“I shall be calling on Fine Gael and Cllr Martin Keane to vote against the bylaws when they come before the council later in the spring.  It’s time we shouted Stop!”
Speaking after a Traffic Management meeting held last week, Cllr Michael McLaughlin revealed that the proposal would be put on display now for a public consultation period. He told The Mayo News that the meeting – which was not attended by Cllr Martin – had debated amendments to a number of the proposals, particularly residential parking and the level of charges in the core of the town.
“We rejected a proposal to charge in-town residents €10 a year for parking  and increased a guest permit for residents to 50 complimentary passes annually. We have also proposed that there would be 10-minutes free parking at key locations in the town centre, for example, at newsagents or a pharmacies “ Cllr McLaughlin explained.
Responding to Cllr Martin’s claim that it would be ‘the death-knell’ for small shops, Cllr McLaughlin said: “I totally disagree with Keith Martin. I think he is being sensationalist. Sure you have to pay for parking in Castlebar too. These charges will only be implemented in the core of the town and if people want they can park on the outskirts.”