Frustrations rise over school drop off as church outlaws public parking
Fr. Liam Power, at the Pentecost Sunday Celebration at St. Joseph and St Benildus Church. Photo: Joe Evans
Frustrations over school drop-offs and car parking in the Newtown area of Waterford City have been mounting in recent weeks, with the public closure of the parish car park at St. Joseph and St. Benildus’ Church in Newtown, Waterford City, at the start of the new school year.
A large notice was erected in the church’s car park explaining the new parking restrictions in recent weeks, to the frustration of many parents.
The car park has long served as an informal pick-up and drop-off for families and schoolchildren in the area but will not serve as such anymore.
The notice placed outside the church states that only those attending the church, or partaking in activities attached to or associated with the church, may use the car park going forward, as the church cannot facilitate a ‘public’ car park any longer.
A public meeting was held last week on Monday, September 21, at the Woodlands Hotel where members of the parish, parents' associations, school boards and Waterford Council representatives proposed potential solutions for the issue.
Parish Priest Fr Liam Power spoke to the Waterford News & Star after the meeting, detailing why the church had to take a stance against the use of the parish car park in St Joseph and St Benildus to drop off and collect pupils of nearby schools, and of the alternatives for school drop-offs and collections.
“I regret having taken the action that we did, in closing the use of the car park for parents to drop off and collect children,” Fr Power said, continuing to say he felt he had no choice but to close the car park from public use after a risk assessment deemed the situation unsafe.
Feeling that the car park couldn’t hold the volume of traffic it was seeing during school drop-off and collection times, and that an injury was bound to happen, Fr Power ordered a risk assessment for the car park.
The assessment, which was carried out by professional Health and Safety Consultants Eurosafe, assessed the practice of parents using the church car park in St Joseph and St Benildus to drop off children in the morning and, in the afternoon, to pick up children attending the local schools of De La Salle College, Waterpark Primary and Secondary Schools, and Newtown National School.
The Eurosafe report concluded that the parish car park was not designed to cope with the volume of traffic using it at the peak hours of school opening and closing, as there are over 2,000 pupils attending schools in the vicinity, Fr Power explained.
“The risk assessment is very clear in that there’s a high risk of injury to a child if we continue (operating as a public car park),” Fr Power said, adding that the legal advice given to him was to close the car park to parents.
At the recent public meeting, Fr Power outlined many proposals he believes may solve the congestion issues facing parents in the area, from the implementation of a river bus to the reintroduction of a vacant car parking facility.
"The long-term solution, I think they all agree, is the introduction of the bus connects network,” Fr Power told this newspaper, saying, “My big thing was to plead for that as soon as possible.”
He added that Waterford Council representatives confirmed the programme would be rolled out within the next year, “So that was very, very good news.”
In the short term, however, a number of proposals were floated by Fr Power and members of the community, including the reintroduction of a vacant, derelict site on the Newtown Road, which has sought planning permission for a car park in recent days.
Other solutions include a designated walking/cycling trail for pupils travelling to and from school, a designated drop off and collection point for parents to leave children to walk the rest of the way in line with the stride to school programme, potential carpooling and bus hiring organised by parents travelling in the same direction and the introduction of a river bus from Ballygunner to a constructed pontoon near Waterpark College, designed similarly to the river taxis along London’s River Thames.
Staggering school start and finish times may also help to avoid congestion, Fr Power added.
Following the public meeting held last week, a committee will be set up to consider both short and long-term solutions for parents in the area.
Another major step forward, Fr Power told this newspaper, comes in the form of political pushback, as Deputy David Cullinane pledged to raise the issue at Dáil Éireann, while Deputies John Cummins and Mary Butler pledged to raise it with the Minister for Transport.
“I was very pleased council officials came,” Fr Power said, reiterating the point made by the council that the culture in the area needs to shift away from cars and move towards public transport options.
