Debate contribution: Road Infrastructure: Craigavon Area Hospital

Debate contribution by Mr Doug Beattie MC on 25 March 2025.

MLA

Mr Doug Beattie MC

Party at the time

Ulster Unionist Party

Date

25 March 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Adjournment

Heading

Road Infrastructure: Craigavon Area Hospital

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4866957

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I will certainly not take 15 minutes. I hope that this can be a debate in which we interact with one another about a particular issue at Craigavon Area Hospital. I start by thanking the Minister for Infrastructure for coming along to be part of the debate. My aim is to highlight genuine infrastructure issues and concerns near the hospital. As we all know, Craigavon Area Hospital is a major site in our acute hospital network, serving more than 241,000 people. Since it was built in 1972, there have been major changes and developments — I am talking mostly about housing developments and changes to the schooling system — and the road network has not kept up with those. Now we have real concern that the road infrastructure around the hospital is not fit for purpose and could inhibit accessibility to the hospital in an emergency. At certain times of the day in that neck of the woods, with traffic coming from all directions to the roundabout at Craigavon Area Hospital, there is gridlock, and I am fearful that, at times, ambulances are not able to get through. It really is an emergency, and it compromises our ability to get people to the hospital quickly. I will lay out a few issues, and I am sure that my fellow MLAs from Upper Bann and those who are not from Upper Bann may be able to add more. The road leading from the Rushmere Shopping Centre in Craigavon towards the hospital, which is Mandeville Road, goes from a dual carriageway to a single carriageway just as it enters a major housing area at the Kernan roundabout. It is difficult for me to paint a picture of it, but we are talking about a busy dual carriageway that hits a roundabout at Kernan no more than, I would say, 600 metres from the roundabout at the hospital, when it suddenly turns into a single carriageway. That, invariably, creates a serious bottleneck. I know that it creates a serious bottleneck, because I happen to live in that neck of the woods and I cannot get out in the mornings because of the traffic. There is no way of changing that single carriageway into a dual carriageway. We just have to deal with the gridlock, which is set to get worse, because more housing developments are going up in the area. I can stand here with others, and we can say, "We need housing". Of course we need housing, and we are in support of housing, social housing and creating space for people, but we need to make sure that the infrastructure can match the housing that is going up. With housing being built, however, there are more cars, more children going to school and, invariably, more gridlock around the hospital. We have Portadown Integrated Nursery and Primary School being moved from Seagoe Road on to Mandeville Road. There are issues with that move, I have to say, but they are not infrastructure issues. They are with the Department of Education, because that move has been delayed and we do not now know when it will take place. We thought that it was going to take place in this or the next financial year. That is not likely to be the case, but the plan is still for the school to move on to Mandeville Road, which will create more traffic going into the school. Indeed, an issue was raised by a DUP colleague at the council, I think, about a flooding risk that comes from the school on to Kernan playing fields. We have six schools in the vicinity of Craigavon Area Hospital. Those are Southern Regional College; Craigavon Senior High School; Bocombra Primary School; Seagoe Primary School; Portadown Integrated Nursery and Primary School; and Killicomaine Junior High School. Therefore, a huge flow of traffic already heads into what is quite a small road network around the hospital, creating a high volume of traffic at key times of the day, with high levels of traffic coming in from Mandeville Road, Seagoe Road, Lurgan Road, Killycomain Road and Kernan Road. For the Minister, those are probably just the names of roads that mean nothing. It means, however, that every single access road heading to the hospital is gridlocked at some time of the day. Normally, that is first thing in the morning as kids are heading to school, but there are problems later in the day and during hospital visiting hours.

There was meant to be a traffic alleviation scheme. The original design would have seen a road junction joining the Bracken and Lisnisky Crescent estates, leading down to the A27, while making the rear entry to the hospital accessible. I think that the Minister knows that those plans are sitting on a shelf in her Department awaiting funding, but they have been stalled.

I thank the Member for that really important point. I will try to explain the problem as best I can. I think that the residents that you are talking about include those of Bracken and Lisnisky Crescent. The plan was always for a road to go through those two estates, heading down to the A27 and into the back of the hospital. That was always going to be the case. However, we are so far down the road now that, in the minds of people who have moved into the area, that would be an impingement for which they were not prepared. We will get what could have been avoidable objections from an awful lot of people, so we will have to go into a series of consultations with people. You are absolutely right. If you look at the other side, at the wonderful road that has now been reopened that goes from the Kernan roundabout and heads past the Kernan cemetery, you see that it is being used as a rat run in the way that you mentioned. The speed of the traffic going down that road now is pretty bad. The problem is, of course, that the roundabout stops you getting onto that road. I agree with the Member that there has to be consultation at every level. We all know about Lisnisky Lane, which goes up the back of Craigavon Area Hospital. It was resurfaced a number of years ago. The resurfacing was only temporary because the Department was going to put in that new infrastructure, which has now been delayed well beyond what we thought it would be. That temporary resurfacing on Lisnisky Lane is starting to crumble and degrade. Lisnisky Lane is no longer fit to cope with the level of traffic that is using it. Craigavon has the largest active travel network, from Newry canal to Lough Neagh and Lurgan, yet the number of cars in the area is increasing due to the number of people who are coming to use the hospital and the change in the hospital network. That is becoming a genuine issue, not just for the people who live there, of whom I am one, although that is not why I brought the topic to the Chamber. It is a huge issue for anybody who has to go to the hospital, possibly in an emergency; anyone who has to transit from Lurgan to Portadown and use that road, because it cannot be avoided, to go to the Southern Regional College (SRC) campus; and pupils of Craigavon Senior High School who now have to go to the Portadown campus because the Lurgan campus was closed, which has increased the traffic further. I apologise because it is difficult to explain the challenges. I invite the Minister — it is a genuine invitation — to come down and look at the network around the hospital. That might help her Department to free up the funds to get the traffic alleviation scheme in place so that the rear entrance to Craigavon Area Hospital can be used. I say that with the full understanding that we need to engage with the residents, because the residents of that area have changed. There are people who have bought houses there without knowing about the original proposals. We may have to revisit that. Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, Minister and all the Members who have turned up to talk about an important issue for many people in that area.

1,396 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

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