Hazardous roadside water cuts may be filled with stones

Consideration is to be given to filling roadside water cuts with stones in order to improve safety.

The water cuts, which are designed to stop water accumulating on road surfaces, can become a hazard, a meeting of Graiguecullen Portarlington Municipal District was told. 

Cllr Ashling Moran raised the issue in a motion when she asked  “that this council carry out water cuts on the N80 from Graiguecullen to Simmons Mill as the water is pooling on both sides of the road after rainfall.” 

Senior Executive Engineer, Philip McVeigh said “Laois County Council will identify the number of locations where water cuts are needed along this stretch of the N80. We will then arrange for these works to be carried out in the coming weeks.”

Cllr Moran said she noticed the potential hazard posed by deep cuts “when my kids started driving and they got to pull over.” 

Mr McVeigh said “you could fill the water cut with stones so that the water would still get through it but a car can still drive over it.” 

Cllr PJ Kelly also took issue with deep cuts as he said landowners who are cutting hedges can hit the mini banks with hedgecutters. “When the scoop of the bucket is taken up it creates a mini bank and later on in the year when the grass grows up, that bank is hidden and hedgecutters are hitting those lumps of banks,” said Cllr Kelly. He asked that they be levelled off in order to avoid such a scenario.