Mayo councillor claims roads around Ballina were 'atrocious' due to frost

The Cathaoirleach of Mayo County Council has questioned if the main roads around Ballina were gritted overnight after he receiving reports that roads in the north of the county were 'atrocious' this morning.

Bonniconlon-based councillor John O'Hara told the meeting of the Ballina Municipal District that he received eight phone calls first thing in the morning from constituents complaining about the state of the roads.

Temperatures plummeted to below zero degrees Celsius in many parts of Mayo overnight with many roads left in hazardous conditions due to overnight frost.

Mayo County Council stated that all the major roads included in their Winter Maintenance Service Plan were gritted but Cllr O'Hara questioned the effectiveness of the gritting.

“One of the people I was speaking to this morning was going to Ballymote to the mart and he left the Killala area. The roads in Mayo were atrocious but as soon as they hit the border of Sligo they were all done. That is wrong and I don't care what anyone says. These people were back and over the road with no grip.

“People don't mind the side roads not being gritted but the main roads weren't gritted... they are not one bit happy when the main roads are not done. They said to me they were atrocious and I don't want to be taking phone calls as a representative and listening to what I have to listen to this morning. It is not fair to people going early in the morning and the roads are like glass,” he said.

The Fine Gael councillor was supported by Crossmolina-based councillor Michael Loftus who once again raised the absence of gritting on the R315 road from Ballycastle to Crossmolina. He said the people use that road every morning to get to work in Castlebar and not having it treated was not good enough.

“There are going to be serious issues in relation to gritting. I know it was near impossible for a lot of people to go to work this morning and a lot of them are our own staff in the council. There is no excuse that this road is not done and it is a serious mistake,” he said.