Road-widening on Navan-Slane route

Major reconstruction works undertaken by Meath County Council near the Donaghmore round tower on the Navan-Slane road will come as a relief to fracture patients who have to be transported from various parts of Meath to Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda, a local councillor said this week. The council is carrying out road-widening along a 1km stretch of the N51, starting just past the access road to the tower at a cost of €2.5 million. Up to now, the road was regarded as one of the most dangerous stretches in Meath, with an extremely narrow carriageway bounded on the Boyne river side by a wall and hedging on the other. The road surface had also become uneven and dangerous, especially in winter. Fianna Fail Cllr Tommy Reilly said this week that the work was long overdue but that he was nevertheless glad that the council had agreed to undertake the work. "I have been trying for some years to get the council's attention on this. It was to be done some time ago but the money was shifted to another project and the work was put off. That was very disappointing for people who had to use the road on a daily basis and it wasn't very pleasant for fracture patients when they were being taken by ambulance to Drogheda, now that the fracture clinic is there," he said. "People from Kells, Athboy and Trim who have suffered injuries in accidents would normally be taken along this route. It looks as if the council has taken a good run at it and, hopefully, it will be completed before the worst of the winter comes in," said Cllr Reilly. The Fianna Fail councillor said that when this project was completed, the council would have to take a look at repairing the Navan-Slane Road running between Delaney's of Dunmoe and Wiggers Cross. Cllr Reilly said that while some safety precautions had been put in force in the lead-up to Wiggers Cross, there was a strong need for the council to install a 'mirror-type' reflector for traffic emerging onto the cross from the Gormanlough direction. He said that drivers emerging from that road were "dicing with death" every time they tried to manoeuvre onto the cross.