Huge show of cross-party support for rail reopening at Sligo conference

A major regional development conference, held in the Radisson Hotel, Sligo, has heard calls for urgent infrastructural investment in the west including the completion of the final leg of the Western Rail Corridor project reconnecting Mayo to Sligo, once the planned Galway-Mayo section of the railway has been completed. Prominent members of all political parties were present to show their strong support for the protection of the line for rail use only and its redevelopment as an economic driver for the North West region. The conference was entitled ‘Delivering Regional Balance - the essential role of infrastructure’.

Public representatives in attendance included Ministers Dara Calleary and Alan Dillon, Deputies Éamon Ó Cuív, Rose Conway Walsh, Pádraig McLoughlin, Catherine Connolly, Peadar Tóibín, Sean Canney and local TDs Marc MacSharry and Martin Kenny. Senators Lisa Chambers, Seán Kyne and Victor Boyhan were also present along with MEPs Maria Walsh, Chris MacManus and Luke Ming Flanagan and more than thirty County Councillors from across the region. A number of other European election candidates, including Ciarán Mullooley, Saoirse McHugh, Michelle Smith and Daniel Pocock, also attended.

Messages of support were received from Senator Pauline O'Reilly, Brian Leddin TD, Michael Fitzmaurice TD, Denis Naughten TD and Senator Paddy Burke.

Also in attendance were representatives of rail groups across the country including Cllr Michael Connolly, Chair of the Western Inter County Railway Committee; Steve Bradley, Mary Casey and Peter McCarron of the Into the West group; Canon David Crooks and Charles Duncan Barclay of the West Ulster Rail Initiative and Kieran Dalton of South East on Track. The President of ATU Sligo Students Union, Jeremiah Egberongbe and Jim Deegan Chief Executive of Railtours Ireland also attended.

More than 80 towns were represented at the conference which was organised by West on Track and hosted by Sligo Chamber, with over 300 people attending from across the region, representing community groups, organisations for the disabled, chambers of commerce, IRDs, the Western Development Commission and local development associations. There was also strong representation from multi-national and indigenous business, and freight interests.

Welcoming the large attendance on behalf of Sligo Chamber, David Kiely noted that the North West region had been downgraded to a ‘Lagging Region’ by the European Commission when its GDP per head of population fell to 71 percent of the European average, and is now ranked 218^th out of 234 in terms of infrastructural development with only 16 regions worse off in Europe.

In his official address, the Mayor of Sligo, Cllr Declan Bree, said that poor transport infrastructure has hindered Sligo’s potential while other designated Regional Growth Centres with good transport and communication links continue to develop strongly. “If transport access infrastructure is not upgraded, there is far greater certainty that the NW region and Sligo will continue to lag even further behind the more developed Eastern and Southern regions. IDA client companies, manufacturers, small and medium sized enterprises and those involved in the agricultural and food production sector, in Sligo and Mayo are all seeking the reopening of the Western Rail Corridor,” he said.

The conference heard presentations from Dr Orla Flynn, President of the Atlantic Technological University (ATU), economist Dr John Bradley, Joe Gilmore (CE, Ireland West Airport), Mike Devane (Atlantic Economic Corridor chambers group) and John Daly, economist with the Northern and Western Regional Assembly.

The conference was chaired by Paul Deering, Editor of the Sligo Champion newspaper.