LISMORE TOWN COUNCIL is writing to the regional roads authority in Tramore in search of a ‘logical explanation as to why the National Roads Authority write road surface signs upside down!’ The move follows the failure by the NRA to respond to an earlier request for information at the behest of Cllr Bernard Leddy at last November’s meeting.

The councillor was exasperated by ‘incorrect use the English language’ as exemplified by such notices as:  ‘Stop To Prepare’ when read from the top down. He cited ‘Ahead Entrance Concealed’ as a more recent manifestation.

Town Clerk Karen Hallahan said her inquires failed to find any reference to protocol within NRA generated literature but that the road signage does conform to “national standards.” Cllr Leddy said the methodology was unknown on the Continent and argued that a driver without English as their first language could have come to grief by they had deciphered the message! The town clerk’s suggestion that the regional offices be asked to comment, rather than repeating the exercise with the NRA, was accepted.

BY common consensus the state of the Tallow road presently reflects the worse condition the surface has presented since the days of donkey transport. In several locations, large potholes and crumbling infrastructure co-exist, like living creature intent on some fiendish plan to multiply and colonise the rural byway. Driving -in the dark and rain particularly- amounts to playing a form of four-wheeled Russian roulette, in which the loser claimed by a gaping void disappears forever into its depths.

The cause lies primarily with the most recent cold weather of course, while the solution is in the lap of the local authorities.  The road meanders through two county council jurisdictions. At January’s Town Council meeting, Lismore Town Clerk Karen Hallahan said she believed the problem was of priority concern to Waterford County Council. At the Youghal equivalent the following day, the word from Cork County Council’s representative and town engineer, Paul Murray, was that road is to be resurfaced “during the coming year.” It has since emerged that Cork County Council are about to embark on emergency repairs.  Meanwhile if anyone hears a cry for help emanating from the bowels of the earth, get off one’s ass (or mule) and cast down a rope.