‘Beyond a joke’ - Carlow house hunters ‘freaking out’ amid housing development delays

House hunters in County Carlow are “freaking out” amid a number of delays to two housing developments in a local town.

The issue of housing delivery in Tullow was raised by independent councillor Will Paton at the March plenary meeting of Carlow County Council.

Cllr Paton said: “The dates for completion of the Thomas Traynor and the Carlow Road housing developments seem to be what I would call a movable feast.

“It’s got to the stage now where it’s beyond a joke. We were looking at allocations on the Carlow Road nearly a year and a half ago at one stage.

“I mean these were actually in reports. These aren’t figures I’m making up. It seems to me that these so called infrastructural issues - they’re a bit of a joke at this stage like.”

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He went on to outline the anxiety this is causing for people who are looking to find a home in the area.

“I cannot tell you the number of calls and messages I get on a daily basis from people absolutely freaking out and panicking that they will be living on the side of the road if they don’t get housing shortly.

“I feel for them and I really do think we need to do something very very strong about getting a delivery date and getting on with it.

“I mean even if we know we’re a couple of weeks away, what’s stopping us from making the announcements to potential tenants that they’re going to get a house. At least take that fear away from them.”

Cllr Paton also advised the council to allocate all of the houses on the one day to avoid further issues.

“What is going to happen is somebody gets say one of the 21 first and doesn’t like it. They’re going to automatically turn it down and look for a house in the second lot.

“But if we allocate all the houses on the same day it would cut out this ‘well, I’ll turn this house down because I’ll get one in the other estate’. It would cut out an awful lot of messing around.

“Like, take it this way, there’s a two-bedroom apartment in Slaney House. Two different people turned it down.

“You know there’s also this whole thing about people being desperate but it appears very much that beggars can be choosers.”

He concluded by asking when people will begin moving into the developments on the Thomas Traynor Road and the Carlow Road.

These sentiments were echoed by Fine Gael councillor Ben Ward, who described the political difficulties it is creating for councillors.

Cllr Ward said: “I have to agree with Cllr Paton. I mean this has been pushed back month after month after month after month.

“I mean it looks like a credibility issue like when we keep telling people one thing and another thing happens. I mean it’s just ridiculous at this point.”

In response, Director of Services Fiona O’Neill said that it wouldn’t be possible to allocate the two housing developments together. She went on to provide an update on the status of the two estates.

Ms O’Neill said: “So in the context of the 48 units in Tullowbeg, I think the last update I gave at the council meeting here was that the ESB were on site and that they’re works are supposed to be finished by the end of March this year, 2026. So that’s still ongoing there.

“In the context of the 21 units on Thomas Traynor Road, those units are now completed and we are going through the process to close the sale on those units so we have to wait until we do get keys.

“That’s going to take another couple of weeks. The allocations are ready and persons will be notified as soon as the sale of the units has closed.”

She concluded by saying that that process should be completed in approximately the next three weeks.