Greenways can’t be left to decay after opening, councillors warn - Donegal Daily

A long-term maintenance plan should be built into every future Greenway project in Donegal, councillors agreed this week.The proposal calls for all new Greenway...

A long-term maintenance plan should be built into every future Greenway project in Donegal, councillors agreed this week.

The proposal calls for all new Greenways to come with a plan and budget for their upkeep over the following 10 or 20 years, rather than leaving them to become overgrown and unusable shortly after opening.

The measure was added to a motion from Muff-based Councillor Terry Crossan, who warned that existing Greenways are already suffering from a lack of dedicated maintenance funding.

“I have been inundated all summer about areas of the local Greenway being overgrown by briars and all sorts of weeds," Cllr Crossan told Monday's plenary meeting.

He said he had been informed that €17,000 had to be redirected in the Inishowen Municipal District to allow Greenway works to be carried out.

Cllr Martin Scanlon from the Lifford-Stranorlar MD proposed an amendment to Cllr Crossan’s motion calling for the maintenance costs of future Greenways to be considered from the outset.

“I think we should be making it that, going forward for the Greenways, that any new proposals made for the county should come with a maintenance plan of maybe 10 or 20 years,” he said.

"It is something like what the Government does with capital projects like hospitals or schools, or even the courthouse in Letterkenny, where the contractor looks after these for a set period and that is built in.

"That proposal should be put to TII, that going forward, that is the only thing that we would be accepting,” Cllr Scanlon said.

Supporting Cllr Crossan’s motion, Cllr Martin McDermott warned that the state of local Greenways was making it increasingly difficult to promote new developments to stakeholders.

"It is a very difficult sell at the moment when you drive up the Muff stretch and look at the state of the Greenway that is there," Cllr McDermott said.

“It is a difficult sell, particularly to farmers and landowners who have to give up land that they are farming when they see the Greenway, particularly that Greenway, and the state that it is in.”

Cllr McDermott said the council needed to have a “strong conversation” about the future direction of Greenways and called for greater consultation with farmers and landowners.

He said around 100 farmers had attended a meeting in Carndonagh concerning a proposed Greenway from Muff to Gleneely, with another public meeting due to take place.

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“There are very genuine questions that farmers and landowners have and I think we need to be sure as a council that we are answering those questions for those farmers,” he said.

Cllr McDermott also the Buncrana to Bridgend project as an example where he believed better consultation could have taken place.

Director of Roads Bryan Cannon and Transportation told the meeting that Donegal currently has six separate Greenways at various stages of development.

“Should they be developed, they will be a fantastic asset to our county, bringing people into the county, as we have seen across the country in other locations,” he said.

“Significant economic activity has been generated on foot of the development of Greenways.”

Mr Cannon confirmed that while TII is funding the capital development of the projects, there is no specific allocation for maintaining completed Greenways.

He said the council had made that specific request during TII delegations over a number of years.

But as a result of the funding gap, Roads Service teams in the relevant Municipal Districts currently have to use their roads maintenance allocations when work is needed on a Greenway.

Mr Cannon said those same budgets are already facing “significant demand” to maintain Donegal’s existing road network.

“Should a specific budget allocation for the maintenance of Greenways be agreed, either as part of the 2027 Revenue Budget process or received from our external funders, it would be most welcome,” Mr Cannon said.

See more: Former greenway officer shocked as paths fall into decay