M28 compulsory purchase order ‘has had a devastating effect on me and my family’

A widow became emotional yesterday as she explained how she would become “a prisoner” in her own home if plans for a €180m Cork-Ringaskiddy motorway were given the green light.

Anne O’Dea, who owns a house on Maryborough Hill, said it is still not clear how much of her land Cork County Council plans to take in order to secure a 16m-wide, three-lane carriageway outside her home, and an adjoining new overbridge for the proposed M28 motorway.

She built her house with her late husband in 1983 in what was, at the time, an idyllic rural area.