Kerry council urged to go ‘back to drawing board’ on key junction that is talk of the town

Cllr Kennelly said ‘everyone in town’ is questioning the removal of a roundabout at a busy Listowel junction

Councillors were unanimous in their condemnation of the new traffic measures at the Clieveragh Junction, Listowel, all asking Kerry County Council to revert the crossing back to its original state as a roundabout.

The Listowel bypass, which was opened in June 2024, has delivered a much-needed traffic management improvement for the town but works also included the removal of a roundabout at the key Clieveragh crossroads, replacing it with a controlled lights system.

When the new junction that links Ballylongford Road with the John B Keane Road and Upper William Street opened in 2023, The Kerryman reported widespread confusion and danger at the crossing.

While most councillors at the recent Listowel Municipal District meeting reported locals avoiding the crossing, Councillor Aoife Kennelly said that one couple had even stopped shopping in the town altogether.

“Everyone in town is questioning why we got rid of the roundabout in the first place and can we not put it back, so I think we’re going to have to go back to the drawing board with this one,” said Cllr Kennelly.

“Now you have people not just avoiding the junction but avoiding the town completely, so something badly needs to happen here.”

Councillor Jimmy Moloney asserted that there had been collisions at the crossing and asked to sit down with the council’s safety team. He also decried the state of the junction at rush hour, saying he had sat through five sequences of the traffic lights to arrive at the council meeting that morning.

A councillor officer contradicted Cllr Moloney, stating there had been no recorded collisions at the junction between January 2024 and May 2025, with a senior council engineer saying they didn’t believe stories of people avoiding Listowel due to the crossing.

While people may feel uncomfortable using the junction, they reasoned, but they are in fact safer. He extorted the councillors not to “throw it away” and said concerns are probably easing.

The roundabout was removed due to one significant accident that occurred and multiple pedestrian incidents at the surrounding crossings. The introduction of controlled traffic lights at the crossroads in 2023 was intended to provide a more pedestrian and cycle-friendly junction and make it safer for motorists.

At the time of opening, councillors complained about inadequate road markings, while crashes and scrapes were reported in the first few weeks. Fine Gael Councillor at the time, Mike Kennelly, said “we have put lives in danger” and urged the council to revert to the old roundabout system.

“It isn’t working, it hasn’t worked, it’s not a straight forward box junction. It was a loaded gun that was opened up at 3pm on a Wednesday afternoon,” he said after its opening.

“It was a laughing stock. It was a loaded gun with that traffic light system. I don’t want anyone here to say it will be fine, that old Irish adage, it won’t be fine. My motion is to move back to the old roundabout system.”

At the meeting this week, councillors were shown the current traffic light modelling of the cross, indicating that the current light sequence was the best solution, despite councillors concerns over large tail backs during the morning rush.

Cllr Moloney invited safety auditors to come and look out his window to see the traffic, unhappy with the answers provided by the council.

He reasoned that authorities had spent tens of millions of euros on the bypass to improve motor traffic and the junction was clearly in contradiction to this principle.

“What’s been said from county elected members is facts, we don’t want to be coming in here and creating problems, but this is what is being said to us all over North Kerry, not just in Listowel town,” said Cllr Moloney.

“People are just avoiding this junction now and I know collisions might have gone down and a large reason why that might be the case is that people are just avoiding it.

“Could we actually meet with the safety audit team and explain what’s going on…can we not scrap it and go back to the drawing board, and get the traffic flowing for what the project was originally intended and meant to do for investment in the area?”

Cllr Kennelly agreed the council needed to go back to the drawing board and reintroduce the roundabout.

“I know you’ve done all the research and you have all the data but facts and figures mean nothing to the people of Listowel who are using it everyday, who hate using it and are avoiding it,” she said.

Both Councillor Liam “Speedy” Nolan and Michael Foley echoed the other councillor’s comments, with Cllr Nolan saying people were on “tenterhooks” when approaching the junction.

Funded by the Local Democracy Reporting scheme