Debate contribution: Road Infrastructure: Craigavon Area Hospital

Debate contribution by Mr Jonathan Buckley on 25 March 2025.

MLA

Mr Jonathan Buckley

Party at the time

Democratic Unionist Party

Date

25 March 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Adjournment

Heading

Road Infrastructure: Craigavon Area Hospital

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4866968

Read the official Assembly record

Text

First, I thank my constituency colleague Doug Beattie for securing the Adjournment debate. It is a very important debate about a strategic asset located at the heart of our constituency, particularly for those from Portadown who live daily with the traffic implications around the hospital. This is significant. We are truly grateful to have a hub hospital such as Craigavon Area Hospital on our doorstep. It does tremendous work. It has a 450-bed capacity and serves an estimated 240,000 people across Northern Ireland. People from constituencies as far as Newry and Armagh, Fermanagh and South Tyrone, South Down, Lagan Valley and further afield access that hospital daily. The issues with the road infrastructure will not be easily fixed. Mr Beattie attempted to take us through the myriad roundabouts in Craigavon and the country lanes. It will not be easy to have a sustainable solution in the short term. I am particularly concerned about the Lisnisky Lane/Lisnisky Road issue. I have grown up knowing that development in its current state, and, in my lifetime, there has been no through road. I stress to the Minister that opening the road to enhance access to the hospital would be viewed by the residents as creating a rat run, as has happened in other areas. That is not in the interests of those residents. Residents who live on the fringes of Craigavon Area Hospital have told horrific stories about patients who have escaped from mental health facilities and of brutal murders that have happened. We have to live in a world where we respect those who live in the vicinity. To respect those who live in the vicinity, we must take regard of their views on what opening up that stretch of road would look like. I agree with my colleague Diane Dodds and, indeed, Doug Beattie that the residents must be front and centre of any consideration. By my reckoning and from what I have heard of the feedback, the residents have said a firm no to opening up the road. I want to talk about the wider issue. Doug is absolutely right: there is a huge issue that stretches way beyond the particular issue at Lisnisky. The road infrastructure is not in good shape. I have mentioned the number of people who transit the country to Craigavon Area Hospital. The recent statistics from the Minister's Department show that, this winter, the potholes on the road network between Lurgan and Craigavon Area Hospital were worse than anywhere else. There are already issues with the road network: it is tired. Mr Beattie mentioned that the temporary resurfacing of Lisnisky Lane has already opened up with potholes that, once again, have caused concern for the local residents. If we are going to fix the problem in the longer term, we must look at the traffic flow patterns, particularly at the edges of the larger roundabouts and how that impacts on the traffic flow and timely access to emergency care.

Yes.

The Member has raised a good point. What emergency planning has the Department carried out in conjunction with the Department of Health on access to a key hospital such as Craigavon Area Hospital? I hope that I have expressed the concerns about the Lisnisky Lane/Lisnisky Road issue clearly to the Minister. I feel that we have. On the wider issue, Mr Beattie hit on an interesting point: one of the key concerns is to do with the Northway, which is a huge trunk road that leads to many local services on the Northway or towards the hospital. There is a major concern about a more regular occurrence, and that is the failure of the traffic lights, which happens time and time again. You would be surprised, although I am sure that Members have got caught up in it, at the significant disruption that signal failure causes, particularly on the Northway, with traffic backing up towards the centre of Craigavon and on to the schools that Mr Beattie mentioned or to the hospital. That needs to be looked at. Traffic flow is an important issue that the Department could, perhaps, address. That may alleviate some of the congestion, rather than our opening up a debate about a particular road that would be used largely by those who work on the Craigavon Area Hospital site but cause huge inconvenience to residents. If we can improve traffic flow, we could address the issue that the chief executive has raised of timely access to emergency care. I thank the Minister and the Member who secured the Adjournment debate.

759 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:11 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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