| Author | Message | ||
     XY765 Member Username: Judge Post Number: 267 Registered: 01-2006 |
The Irish Green Party are set to become the minor party in the new coalition government for the very first time, hopefully they'll have some impact in the way this country is being run and the way the environment is being sidelined in the name of 'development'. Here is a really sad example: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/ 2007/05/070515-ireland-tara.html | ||
| peter ward Member Username: Peter_ward Post Number: 39 Registered: 06-2005 |
Hi XY, I live a short distance from the site mentioned in the article and was disappointed to see the Greens sharing government. The Greens will hold up a badly motorway a further ten years, meanwhile thousands of young people forced further down the country by crazy house prices spend needless hours in their cars, not seeing their children from one weekend to the next. The population was once almost double what it is now at one stage and almost all lived in rural settlements, no matter where you excavate in Ireland and the Boyne Valley in particular you'll find evidence of same, on this route(which is further from Tara than the existing road) or any of the proposed alternative routes. I'm green as I can be in my day to day life and yes I hope they bring balance but I hope too they don't grind badly needed infrastructure to a halt. ..I'll get me hemp sandals!! | ||
| XY765 Member Username: Judge Post Number: 269 Registered: 01-2006 |
Hi Peter, I totally agree with you that once you stick a spade in the ground in this country some archaeological find turns up and I'm not against roads per se, it's just the placement of this M3. I'm from Galway and travelling back there can be a total nightmare at the weekends. I bought a house in Dublin about 18 months ago, the option was to get a smaller house in Dublin (we got a 1930s two bed in Drimnagh and we have a 1 year old baby) or go out to the commuter belt and get a bigger house but spend more time commuting. There is to be a large motorway interchange very very near the Hill of Tara and already there are applications to have warehouses and distribution centres located here - it will lead to the place looking like an Industrial Estate. If there was a joined-up and forward thinking public transport plan there would be no need for this motorway, all it will do will get you to traffic jams in Dublin more quickly. You can't even get a train from Galway to Cork without going through Portarlington and this is the 21st century! There were some major aspects of the current government that the Greens were never going to get rid of, like this M3 motorway, the Shell plant in Mayo and the use of Shannon airport for the transfer of US troops to Iraq/Afghanistan and their rendition of civilains from these countries but I do hope they will get the government going on some key environmental issues like water qulaity, waste (landfills and incineration), climate change and carbon credits. Also the amount of development in the east of thse country compared to the west has lead to a lot of these issues where we now find people commuting to Dublin from over 100km away. I'd like to get back to Galway at some stage but can't see it happen as there is little work there for my girlfriend or I. I should say that I work in the environmental field (excuse the pun!) by the way... |