Waterford Councillors are in unanimous agreement that while Active Travel funding is welcome, it doesn't go far enough.
Funds allocated to Waterford under Active Travel funding cannot be used on existing roads and footpaths.
Local Labour Party Councillors brought a motion to this week's Plenary meeting calling on the Transport Minister to allow for ringfenced funding to fix roads that the Council's budgets cannot always include.
The motion reads:
“Waterford City & County Council recognise and appreciate the positive benefits that have been brought about through Active Travel Funding and would welcome more. However, we also acknowledge that limitations on the Active Travel scheme mean that it is increasingly focussed on larger urban areas and cannot be used for the badly needed maintenance and repair of deteriorating footpaths. In the interests of pedestrians, particularly people with disabilities, we therefore hereby resolve to write to Minister Eamon Ryan to formally notify him that we upon the Department of Transport to provide ringfenced funding (separate from roads funds and also distinct from Active Travel funding) to Local Authorities to assist significantly and substantially with the costs of maintaining and repairing existing footpaths and to assist significantly and substantially with the costs of providing new footpaths that are not eligible for
Active Travel funding."
"We further call upon Minister Ryan and the Department of Transport to ensure that Local Authorities would have discretion and autonomy to use such dedicated footpaths funding without having to receive approval from the Department, the NTA, or any other agency, on a per project basis; and to ensure that there would be no other bureaucratic obstacles to the expeditious
spending of such urgently needed footpath funding.”
The motion was passed unanimously by councillors, and it was agreed that it would be circulated to other local authorities nationwide in order to create a conversation surrounding the issue.
