Council face huge claims as residents blame potholes for back pain

A local authority could find itself facing a raft of claims for damages with residents on a quiet country road blaming potholes for an increasing incidence of back pain among them.

Locals in Ralahine South, near Newmarket on Fergus, Co Clare, have repeatedly called on Clare County Council to carry out repairs to the road which they say is also responsible for damaging their cars.

However, the council has said that the road is not a priority .

Local resident Niamh Hogan has written to the local authority repeatedly since late last year about the problems residents face on a daily basis.

While there are just eight houses on the road, a “considerable amount of traffic” including delivery trucks and farm machinery use the route.

“I have met with a number of my neighbours and have discovered that most of us have had increasing back pain over the past few months.

“I believe the condition of the road is a contributing factor and it really needs to be addressed soon,” Ms Hogan said.

“We’ve asked the council several times to send the ‘patching truck’ out to the area.

“The road not only has a considerable amount of large sized potholes but is also is breaking up in a large number of places.”

It is understood that at least one claim for damage to a car has already been submitted to the council.

The authority’s senior engineer, Tom Tiernan, has said however that the road is not a priority at the moment.

“This road would benefit from improvements of this nature but there are tertiary roads in worse condition. While upgrade works won’t be feasible in the near future, some day-to-day maintenance work such as pothole repairs will be carried out shortly,” he said.

“One possible solution would be for the community depending on the road to apply for a Community Involvement Scheme (if the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport provides an allocation for same in 2015).

Such an approach has been very successful in relation to several tertiary roads in east Clare in 2013 and 2014. The area engineer has already advised at least one resident on the road of this,” he added.