Traffic issues in Dundalk on Saturday nights raised at Dundalk JPC meeting

At last week's JPC meeting Fianna Fail councillor Sean Kelly brought up the increase in garda presence around the centre of Dundalk at the weekends. 

The meeting heard of the policing plan local gardai have on Friday and Saturday nights in the town, with the meeting informed that extra patrols and personnel were deployed in areas around the town centre.

Councillor Kelly said that it was “quite clear that  there is a greater presence of gardai in the town centre on Saturday nights.”

He did, however, ask if they could be spread out more throughout the town saying:

“I suppose what we are seeing all the time is that they are always gathered around the Emerald Casino, whereas if they spread out  down towards Brubakers and the Golden Chopstick where big crowds are gathering and sometimes an incident could occur and the gardai have to quickly move down the street.”

He also queried if something could be done about the bottleneck that occurs at the junction of Francis Street and Park Street at the weekend, saying:

“On the weekends, it’s a bugbear of mine, sometimes on a Friday or Saturday evening when you’re driving through town and the traffic is absolute mayhem when you get through Francis street and get to Park Street only to realise that there's somebody double parked blocking one lane of traffic.

“They’re in to pick up a takeaway or something like that and they refuse point blank to move.”

He asked if the gardai could move people along because “they actually give abuse to people who [ask them to move on].”

In response, Inspector John Boyle said that the gardai would “take on board” the issues raised.