New Plan for Enniscorthy school front

By Dan Walsh at Enniscorthy Council Meeting

Safe Routes to School has prepared an outline plan for the front of St. Aidan’s Primary School at Convent Road, Enniscorthy, it was revealed to members at today’s monthly meeting of Enniscorthy Municipal District Council and accepted by the members proposed by Cllr Barbara-Anne Murphy and seconded by Cllr Jackser Owens.

The key findings of the Plan includes inadequate traffic calming measures, signage and road markings at the front and on the approach to the school. The footpaths are narrow and there are insufficient crossing points for the volume of students (approximately 850 pupils and 100 staff members).

Heavy Goods Vehicles were observed along Convent Road during school collection time, there are no cycling facilities, cars were observed at the front of the school and on footpaths during drop off and collection times.

The solutions include wider footpaths, more pedestrian crossings, ramps and three potential Park ‘N Stride locations from the carpark opposite SuperValu, the GAA car park and Orchard Peace Park carpark on Irish St.

Cllr Jackser Owens told the meeting that he works as a school warden and described the situation as “crazy” and “an accident waiting to happen”. “There was chaos there about 8.30am on wet morning, like today,”; he stated. He noted that it is three years since the school grounds carpark closed as a Covid-19 measure and he wondered why this is the case!

Apparently, the Board of Management and the Principal have been asked by the local Council why the new state-of-the-art carpark in the school grounds never re-opened and there has been no response!

Cllr John O’Rourke observed that the Plan is a year old, but only presented now! He felt that a change of attitudes and more high-viz would be helpful.

67.8% of parents surveyed agreed that “road safety” was a problem; 97.5% would support works “front of school” and 96.4% would support “walking and cycling links to school.” It should be noted that there was a 56.4% response to the survey.