Irish Water was leaving Galway City Council open to being sued due to serious trip hazards after it failed to properly reinstate a recently resurfaced school zone during work to reduce leaks.

The water authority had left the newly installed footpaths and resurfaced streets on Raleigh Row in “a complete and utter shambles”, fumed Independent Councillor Mike Cubbard at a meeting of Galway City Council.

Raleigh Row had undergone a major overhaul as part of an Active Travel Plan, with €300,000 paid by the National Transport Authority to the Council to carry out the work as part of its Safe Routes to School project at Scoil Iognáid – the ‘Jes’ primary school.

Utility workers then moved in and dug up the street as part of its “planned watermain rehabilitation works” to replace pipes to homes under the national Leakage Reduction Programme.

“We go in and spend money on Active Travel and then two weeks later we go in and rip it all up,” exclaimed Cllr Cubbard.

“Irish Water have made an absolute ‘hames’ of it.”

He read out an email sent by the Council to Irish Water – revealed in the Galway City Tribune through a Freedom of Information request – in which the Council warned of the serious reputational damage if the work had to be completely redone.

Council Senior Engineer Fiona Hollan said the Council tries to liaise with Irish Water so that work does not have to be carried out a second time.

“The surface on Raleigh Row is a temporary surface and Irish Water are going to be doing a permanent one.”

Cllr Cubbard said he believed Irish Water had indicated the work would not be carried out until Easter.

“That is a serious liability issue. There were serious trip hazards left by Irish Water, from a liability point of view, it leaves the Council open.”

Senior Engineer Colm O’Riordan confirmed the permanent surface would be completed over the Easter school holidays.

“I’ll go down myself to look at it this week.”

The Council announced last week that the road from the junction of Palmyra Park to the junction of St John’s Place/Small Crane will be closed from 7am to 7pm each day from Thursday, March 28 to Friday, April 5 to facilitate resurfacing.

The Safe Routes to School project has already been the subject of disquiet among residents when it emerged taxpayers’ money was used to upgrade car parking spaces in front of the school and turn them into staff-only spaces via locked bollards.