A new integrated transport ticketing system called the Leap Card, has been announced today for, yes you guessed it, the Greater Dublin area. As many as 40,000 holders of smart cards on Iarnrod Eireann (30,000) and Luas (10,000), will immediately have their cards replaced with these Leap cards.
North Tipperary’s TD Alan Kelly was on hand, as usual, for photographs and a wee opportunity for a TV spot. (Matthew 18:20 springs to mind “For where two or three gather together as my followers, I am there among them.“)
The new Leap Card is expected to be available to all commuters by the end of this year. €48m has been spent on the system to date over the last eight years and €55m will have been spent by the time the system is ready to roll.
So now you know why Thurles has no funding for it’s proposed and identified €48m, 8-kilometre, 100 metre wide corridored by-pass. The estimated €48M was spent on an integrated transport ticketing system for Dublin.
The new Thurles integrated transport system
Some good news however for Thurles. We may not have to leap over the shallow end of the river Suir to go shopping this Christmas.
Traffic was at a standstill for 2.5 hours today as workers dropped cement bollards and sand bags into the river to protect the only vehicle crossing into our town. Note, I can not confirm that this means that badly needed repairs to the decaying Barry’s Bridge connecting Thurles to the rest of the world is now imminent. It might have been undertaken because of a severe weather and flood warnings from our good friends in Met Éireann.
Like the new Dublin integrated transport Leap card, one of our resident frogs also came out for a look, but he was to be dissappointed, there was no sign of Alan Kelly, RTE or any other of our North Tipperary politicians in attendance.
Still, all is not lost, Thurles Co-Op are offering a great deal in wellingtons and waterproof waders at present.
Maybe if we just let the bridge fall down they might fix it. The NRA talks alot but doesn’t do alot. The road needs to be redesigned and we need a flat surface on the bridge and it needs to be wider. It took me twenty minutes to get into town yesterday and a ambulance in a emergency was struggling to get through the square. I would like to see a modern bridge on top something to blend in with the arts center but retaining the old character below.
Hi George. Just wondering who left their Shopping Bags on the Barrier. Maybe its a Co Councillor’s Lunch Box?