Breaffy protest demands speed limit reduction

MAKING THEIR POINT Local councillors Michael Kilcoyne, Joe McHale, Blackie Gavin and Cyril Burke head a large of group of residents who gathered in Breaffy to protest for a reduction to the speed limit on the main road from 100km/h to 60km/h.  Pic: Keith Heneghan

Edwin McGreal

A local committee and Castlebar area councillors are to meet in the coming weeks to decide the next step forward in the campaign to have a speed limit reduction in the village of Breaffy.
This follows a week where a protest was called; plans to block the main N60 road were announced and then shelved; a community meeting on Friday night heard a variety of opinions on the best way to proceed and a protest took place on Sunday.
The N60 main Castlebar to Claremorris road passes through the village of Breaffy and the current speed limit is 100km/h. In the village itself the national school has over 400 pupils while on the opposite side of the road there are two hotels in Breaffy House Resort and considerable traffic also at the local GAA pitch. There have been a number of accidents in Breaffy in recent years, though not all related to speed.
Recent village enhancement works have been carried out just off the main N60 road and locals have been campaigning vigourously for the reduction in the speed limit to 60km/h to adequately reflect traffic volumes in the village.
At a well-attended meeting in Breaffy NS Hall on Friday night, called by the Breaffy Road Safety Group, locals were updated on a proposal by Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) for the village.
The proposal includes a 60km/h speed limit for school times during which signs would flash advising motorists of the specific speed limit. These signs – and the school speed limit – would be between Heneghans’ Plant Hire on the Balla side of the village and at an undetermined point on the Castlebar side of the village.
In addition there would be flashing signs permanently telling drivers of their current speed and if they need to slow down, together with a new 80km/h limit from Kilkenny Cross to Kilnock.
Members of the committee said that while they want a permanent 60km/h limit, they felt they should accept the proposal and continue to campaign for a full-time speed limit.
However, while some people in the meeting were in favour of the TII proposals, others said they were only satisfied with a permanent 60km/h limit through the village.
On Sunday a crowd in the region of 200 people turned up for the protest. The protest was called at last Tuesday’s meeting of Castlebar Municipal District and while early indications were the main N60 road would be blocked on Sunday, this part of the protest was called off.
Present at the protest were local councillors Cyril Burke, Blackie Gavin, Michael Kilcoyne and Joe McHale. Local curate Fr John McCormack spoke, as did local school principal George Moran, who is also a member of the Breaffy Road Safety Group.

Traffic survey
At Friday night’s meeting, locals were informed of the results of a week-long traffic survey of the N60 in Breaffy.
Between 9,000 and 10,000 vehicles go through the village on the main road, the meeting was told. The average speed was 69km/h but what is considered a more significant finding is that when 15 percent of traffic is taken out to allow for slow moving traffic and cars entering and exiting side roads in the village, the average speed for the remaining 85 percent of vehicles surveyed was 83km/h.
The maximum speed registered in that time was 146km/h. Crucially, there was no significant reduction in those speed limits during school opening and closing times, the meeting was told.
Councillors met with the TII in early October to push for the 60km/h speed limit but the TII said they were only willing to reduce the limit to 80km/h and added it could be subsequently reviewed at a later stage.
“What we were effectively told by the TII is to reduce it to 80km/h and if there were more casualties, they’d reduce it to 60km/h,” said Cllr Michael Kilcoyne at last Tuesday’s meeting of Castlebar Municipal District.  
The meeting also heard suggestions of a bypass for the village and for the erection of school time speed limits.
Senior Engineer with Mayo County Council Ann Sweeney said there was previous work done on a bypass proposal for the village which could be examined.
“It is one of the busiest roads in the county. Regardless of the speed limit, it could be worth exploring a bypass if the final goal is to remove that level of traffic from the village,” she said.
Breaffy Road Safety Group have contacted local councillors to arrange a meeting in the coming weeks to discuss where the campaign goes from here.