Salt barn delay could spark crisis

A PRE-CHRISTMAS freeze could spell crisis for the Cork region because two massive salt barns scheduled to be completed before the end of next month now won’t be ready until January.

“If we face a similar winter to last year, much of the Cork region will now not have sufficient reserves of salt at hand because these barns will not be completed by Christmas,” warned the chairman of the Cork County Council Western Division, Independent Councillor Declan Hurley, as some forecasts predicted another freezing winter with snow and frigid temperatures.

Work on a 1,400 tonne salt barn in Ballincollig to cater for roads in the north and south regions of Cork and another for Skibbereen, to cover roads in the sprawling west Cork region, was supposed to have begun several weeks ago.

It was envisaged that the barns — for which around €613,000 had been made available by the National Roads Authority and which take eight weeks to build — would be in place by Christmas, and stocked with sufficient salt to cope with the results of any major cold snap.

However, a delay has meant that construction work only began this week.