Clifden Regeneration – 2nd Round Feedback – Connemara Chamber

Clifden Regeneration – 2nd Round Feedback – Connemara Chamber

Clifden Regeneration – 2nd Round of Feedback – Connemara Chamber of Commerce

Letter and related documents to LUC & Galway County Council

 

Connemara Chamber Commence
Platform 6, Galway Road, Clifden,
Connemara, Co. Galway, H71 VH51

 

Mr. Tom Jonson – [email protected]
LUC (Land Use Consultants Limited)
250 Waterloo Road, London SE1 8RD

Mr Ciaran Wynne – [email protected]
Galway County Council, Aras an Chontae,
Prospect Hill, Galway

 

3rd May 2023

 

Re: Second round of public feedback on the Clifden Regeneration Plans

 

Dear Tom / Ciaran,

We thank you for the recent presentation by Tom Johnson (LUC) to Connemara Chamber of Commerce on the revised Clifden Regeneration plans.

Following on from this presentation, we once again reviewed the plans in detail and thereafter presented the revised Clifden Regeneration plans to a public meeting. The purpose of this public meeting (held on the 4th of April 2023) was to both present the revised designs and engage in a discussion regarding same. The meeting was once again independently chaired by Dr. Kevin Heanue, Chairperson of Connemara West.

Presentation – We made a short presentation of your revised Clifden Regeneration plans which included our analysis – please find enclosed presentation.

In-person Survey & Request for Comments – At the end of the meeting, a short survey was carried out to get feedback from the towns people. Please find attached/enclosed the results of the survey.

Sentiment – As you will see from the survey results there is a big (positive) change in sentiment towards the Clifden Regeneration plans, particularly in relation to the Clifden Town Centre plans. It is evident that a large amount of feedback was taken on board by you from our submission to you in July 2022 and other submissions that no doubt you received. Please find survey results attached/enclosed.

From our public meeting, there are general points of feedback but are not limited to the following:

  • Clifden Town Centre –
    • Parking – There remains concerns regarding the parking which include:
      • The reverse parking proposal for Clifden town centre – there still a major concern in the town about the plan to change from ‘drive in parking’ to ‘reverse in parking.’ This proposed change coupled with narrowing of the main road and also the major increase in parallel parking throughout the town will likely result in chaotic and much reduced flow of traffic.
      • More mitigation for future increases in general traffic and for the 30% parking loss
        • We kindly suggest strong consideration be given at this time for an extra story to be added to the tourist office car park on the Galway road. The retention of a higher percentage of publicly available car parking space than was first proposed is very welcome but future proofing parking spaces for this rural town needs to be considered at this point.
      • Live Parking Numbers – to encourage a higher usage of the available parking locations e.g., Tourist Information, SuperValu, St. Joseph’s Church, the new car park at hospital – we suggest the installation of live available parking displays on the approach roads to Clifden town centre.
    • Loading Bays / Disabled Parking / HGV Access – The positioning of loading bays, disabled parking spots need adjustments and more consideration for HGV access for certain locations is needed.
    • Cycle path route adjustments – the starting stopped of the cycle track in the town needs further refinement, for example on the current designs it runs through the Friday market location / festival and event space which would not be practical.
  • Beach Road Quay Area –
    • The revised plans do not include any car parking spaces in the Beach Road area. There is a need to consider the additional of parking spaces for both residents, visitors, fishermen, RNLI in this part of the plan.
  • Harbour Park –
    • The Harbour Park Plan is a hugely welcome addition to the town. Given its ambitious nature and probable high financial cost, we believe an interim plan should be considered for the location, should a general timeframe for delivery of the main plan not be made available.
    • The provision of toilets at this park would be very important.

Please find enclosed all the other comments from the recent meeting.

We continue to receive small but practical suggestions to your revised plans so we will follow-up with these in due course.

Yours Sincerely,

John Sweeney
President – Connemara Chamber of Commerce

 

Encl.

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