Almost 4,000 pedestrians per day are still using the old Salmon Weir Bridge due to issues accessing the adjacent €10 million cycle and footbridge.

Galway City Council has revealed plans to construct a new pedestrian crossing at the Cathedral side of the bridge later this year in an attempt to improve safe access to the new Droichead an Dóchais – a move they say will redirect around 2,000 walkers per day.

A meeting of City Central area councillors was told that the new toucan crossing would be traffic-light controlled and construction would get underway this August.

Executive Engineer Laura Gaffney said that between 1pm and 2pm, which was peak time for the over 17,000 pedestrians passing through the area daily, one person per second was crossing the bridge.

This new crossing would make Droichead an Dóchais more usable, she said, adding that additional lighting would be installed in the area to further improve pedestrian and cyclist safety.

“We aim to have a detailed design completed by May; to go to tender in June or July; and to go to construction in August 2025 . . . after the Arts Festival and Race Week.

“Construction should take four to six weeks,” said Ms Gaffney, and some works would be carried out at night to reduce the impact on traffic.

Cllr Frank Fahy (FG) said he had long advocated for a crossing at this point and said it should have been installed ahead of the new bridge’s opening in May 2023.

“It should also be linked with the pedestrian crossing over to the Cathedral,” he said referring to the existing traffic-light crossing linking the new bridge to Gaol Road.

Ms Gaffney confirmed that it would be linked with that crossing’s sequence.

Cllr John McDonagh asked why traffic lights had been chosen over a zebra crossing.

The decision had been made “based off footfall”, said Ms Gaffney, adding that the new crossing “will be able to be connected with the traffic lights already there so the crossings will occur when traffic is already at a pause”.

The Cross City Link Project, which is currently under judicial review, proposes to install a crossing from the same point at the university side of the bridge, but would instead link to the Cathedral.

Some of the works carried out as part of this temporary crossing would be repurposed in that instance, said Ms Gaffney.

Pictured: The Droichead an Dóchais footbridge with the Salmon Weir Bridge in the foreground.