Push for school bus to serve Limerick city students

COUNCILLORS are to lobby Bus Eireann and the National Transport Authority (NTA) to provide a bus service for students of the six schools in Raheen, Dooradoyle and Mungret.

Fine Gael councillor Daniel Butler had a motion unanimously passed at this month’s Metropolitan District meeting calling for the introduction of a service which he believes could help up to 4,000 students.

There are four primary schools in the fast-growing suburb of Limerick: St Paul’s National School in Dooradoyle, St Nessan’s and Limerick Educate Together in Mungret and Gaelscoil Raithin.

In terms of secondary schools, there is Crescent College Comprehensive in Dooradoyle and Mungret Community College.

The former mayor said: “We have four primary schools and two secondary schools in the area supporting 3,000 to 4,000 students. The area itself is growing, meaning our schools are completely full.”

“Currently we can see in the area a significant growth in the level of traffic at peak times, in particular driven by local employers in Raheen Business Park, University Hospital Limerick, Crescent Shopping Centre and of course school-time traffic,” he said.

Councillor Butler, who has children attending schools in the area, described the introduction of a bus service for students as an “easy win”.

“What I am requesting is a school bus service which follows the natural circular routes in the area to collect and drop children to school in the mornings, reducing traffic on the roads and getting to school safely. This is something that parents in the area have been calling for in recent times. It would be of huge support to those parents and students to see this happening and go some way to reducing traffic, carbon emissions and stress for those involved,” concluded Cllr Butler.

His motion was supported by metropolitan district leader, Cllr Azad Talukder, Fianna Fail, and Social Democrats member Elisa O’Donovan.

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She said: “This is something which is communicated so much to all of us. We have lots of estates in these areas. There are parents who have to take annual leave from work, who cannot work as they need to drive their children to school. I think this could work really well and alleviate a lot of stress for kids and families.”

Labour councillor Joe Leddin warned “the horse may have already bolted”, referencing the new BusConnects plan which is expected to be brought in next year.

A new network route map has already been published, and he pointed out that councillors and the public fed into it during last year’s consultation. His party colleague, Cllr Elena Secas, suggested lobbying the Department of Education instead of Bus Eireann and NTA.