Sir, – The fact that Leo Varadkar supports the construction of Galway's second ring road ("Varadkar tells environmentalists he supports Galway ring road", News, February 18th) is not particularly surprising, and as Minister for Enterprise he is clearly interested in the road's potential economic impact on the city.
However, in responding to the core objections to the road, that it will increase emissions, cause further sprawl and not ultimately reduce congestion, all he has to offer is his “belief” that these won’t happen, despite the plan itself for the road indicating to the contrary.
He’s also happy to repeat the mantra that the road’s construction will free up space in the rest of the city for cyclists, pedestrians and bus users.
This latter point is a crucial part of the case for the ring road, but the only way this “freeing up” will occur is if space is explicitly taken away from cars, something that Mr Varadkar’s (and, for that matter, the Taoiseach’s) party colleagues at local level in Galway have recently demonstrated to be completely unacceptable.
At some point, hopefully soon, all major decisions will be viewed through the lens of their impact on climate and general quality of life.
But for now, we’re still at the stage where Government Ministers say one thing when talking in the abstract, and quite another when it comes to the decisions that they would like to see enacted. – Yours, etc,
DAVE
MATHIESON,
Salthill,
Galway.