'Without lights for several weeks': County Cork streets and developments left in the dark

Streets and housing developments around the county have been left in the dark after a change in the company which is maintaining public lights. Stock image.

Streets and housing developments around the county have been left in the dark after a change in the company which is maintaining public lights.

Councillors attending last Tuesday’s Cork County Council meeting expressed frustration and impatience with what they felt was the lack of progress on repairing broken lights.

Cobh Fianna Fáil councillor Dominick Finn said parts of the town and throughout the electoral area have been in the dark since early summer.

“There are several areas in Cobh that have been without lights for several weeks – one area in a housing estate was without lights for six or seven weeks. There’s one place in Cobh where the lights have been out since May.”

Mr Finn said a pedestrian who had been walking on the footpath in that area recently had been clipped by a passing lorry and the lack of lighting was blamed.

“I can’t understand how it’s taking forever to get these jobs done,” he said.

Fine Gael councillor Anthony Barry described as ‘simply unacceptable’ the situation: “The hour has changed and it’s darkness at 5.30pm and 6pm in the evening – outside the garda station in Carrigtwohill it’s been out for 13 months, it’s a ridiculous situation to be in – we’re getting it in the neck.”

According to Cork County Council’s Director of Services, Niall Healy, the company who previously had the contract to maintain the county’s public lighting system had decided not to continue when it expired this summer and a new firm had taken over the role.

“There is a backlog of faults that the new provider is trying to catch up on,” said Mr Healy, who estimated that there had been up to 1,800 public lights out of action during the summer. He said this had been reduced to around 600.

“They aim to have cleared through the vast majority of those by Christmas time,” he said.

Mr Healy added that the repair job could entail added complexity because the fault might be with cabling rather than the actual lighting equipment itself and this would need attention from ESB Networks.

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