Road dug up again for power cable upgrade just a year after resurfacing

Works have begun, again, for a power cable upgrade on a key city road in Cork which was dug up and resurfaced just a year ago.

Contractors have moved onto a section of the outbound carriageway of Cork’s South City Link Rd in recent days to complete the work on behalf of ESB Networks.

“This latest work was always part of the overall project and disruption should be kept to minimum,” a city council spokesman said. “And the restoration of the road surface is being funded entirely by the company.”

For several weeks last July and August, a section of the road was closed as trenches were dug to take ducts for a critical, high-voltage 110kV cable between the ESB’s Marina generating station on Centre Park Rd, and the Trabeg 110kV station on South Douglas Rd.

The ducts are designed to take new underground cables to replace the existing cables, which were installed in 1961 and 1973 respectively. Those cables had a life span of about 40 years.

The project also involved laying ducting on Centre Park Rd, Monahan Rd, Victoria Rd, Albert Rd, and Albert St.

During that work, engineers built jointing chambers — concert wall-lined vaults into which the cable spools could be inserted — under the road surface at various points along the route.

Those large chambers will now be opened as the engineers install the new cables, and pull them along 500m sections to the next joining chambers, where the cables will be linked together. Those chambers will be backfilled and the road surface will be restored, the council spokesman said.

ESB Networks say the cable upgrade, coupled with the new Marina 110kV GIS switching station and a transformer replacement at Marina and Trabeg 110kV stations, will greatly enhance the electrical infrastructure required to meet future development within the city.

Meanwhile, the city council’s roads department said it is hoping to get National Roads Authority funding to repair a 600-metre section of the inbound carriageway of the South Link Rd.

The road surface from its junction with Boreenmanna Rd has effectively disintegrated.

It is hoped the funding could be secured before the end of this month.

The NRA funded similar remedial repairs earlier this year on a section of the South Ring Rd’s eastbound lane near the Douglas off-ramps.