Near Portmarnock Dart Station, growth of footpath parking forces residents to walk on the road

Only one of the parking spots on the thin street in Earnan’s Wood just off Station Road in Portmarnock was free on a Thursday morning last month.

Three drivers cars had opted to park their cars instead on the footpath.

In doing so, they had blocked the route for pedestrians into the housing estate, unless they stepped out onto the road.

It was actually one of the better days in Earnan’s Wood, said Ciarán Ó Baoighealláin, headed home from college just after 11am. “I mean, there are ones there, which isn’t good.”

But the footpath wasn’t as clogged as sometimes.

He had taken photographs at 8.20am the previous day. Drivers had pulled vans, SUVs and cars up all along the footpath, which runs for about 100 metres.

It has been ongoing for months now and as it has worsened, Ó Baoighealláin has tried to get Fingal County Council to intervene, he says. But to no effect.

The council’s operations department hasn’t been able to do much, because they say that they don’t have a remit for the control of parking within the estate, says Fianna Fáil Councillor Cathal Haughey.

In any case, they also only have two parking wardens for the full county who deal with illegal parking on footpaths, says Social Democrats Councillor Joan Hopkins.

Gardaí don’t seem to be carrying out any enforcement there, says Haughey. “It’s kinda like a no-man’s land.”

A press spokesperson for An Garda Síochána did not respond when asked whether it carried out parking enforcement in the area, or had issued any fines in the past six months.

Without anyone willing to step forward and issue fines, Earnan’s Wood has become a free-for-all as local construction workers and commuters, unable to secure parking up at the Dart Station, says Ó Baoighealláin. “They think it’s okay, because the council haven’t taken it seriously.”

Running out of options

Behind the Portmarnock Dart station, there are 26 homes in the Earnan’s Wood estate.

The illegal parking began to frustrate Ó Baoighealláin earlier this year, moving him to contact a slew of councillors and the council in July, he says. “By then, it had been ongoing for months.”

Fine Gael Councillor Aoibhinn Tormey emailed him back. She had asked the council to send out a parking warden, he says. “Parking wardens never came.”

Haughey, the Fianna Fáil councillor, was told by the council in an email that its operations department had no remit in the area for the control of parking as both the estate and the footpaths “were constructed as part of a full social housing development”.

The response to him from the council said that officials understood there to be “a management arrangement for the monitoring/control of parking in Earnan’s Wood.”

“That was their way of saying they couldn’t do anything about it. Get in contact with the guards,” he says.

Ó Baoighealláin says the parking situation has just been getting worse. “At this point, I’m not sure what to do.”

Knock-on effects

Some of the spike in demand for car parking spaces seemed to stem from nearby construction sites.

On that Thursday morning in September, work was ongoing at numbers 1 to 3 Station Road where Ballymore Portmarnock Ltd is developing 59 houses.

One man in a high-vis construction jacket climbed into one of the cars illegally parked.

Ó Baoighealláin says construction workers parking there seemed to set off a chain reaction. Commuters decided the side-street was fair game too, he says. “We’re close to the train station.”

The following Monday, by 8am, the car park outside Portmarnock Station was full. Around the corner, half of the footpath leading to Earnan’s Wood had been taken over by cars.

It’s become acceptable now, Ó Baoighealláin says. “And the council haven’t taken it seriously.”

A council spokesperson didn’t respond when asked multiple times whether it had sent a parking warden out to the estate and if it had engaged with developers about the use of the footpaths as parking by construction workers.

Haughey – when responding to Ó Baoighealláin’s email back in July – said he had been told by a council clerical officer that the Operations Department had forwarded the complaint to planning to remind builders of their obligations.

Not enough wardens

There aren’t enough traffic wardens in Fingal to enforce, says Joan Hopkins, a Social Democrats councillor. “It’s difficult for them to get around everywhere.”

In similar cases, the council typically advises councillors to contact the guards, says Hopkins. “Because it’s illegal and we’ve more guards than wardens.”

A spokesperson for Fingal County Council said it currently engages a contractor to provide four full-time parking wardens to patrol countywide pay-and-display locations.

Two more wardens are contracted to carry out enforcement in non-pay-and-display locations – specifically for the enforcement of illegal parking like on footpaths, they said.

The council has no plans to extend the current contract further at present, they said.Between January and July 2024, Fingal County Council issued 8,732 parking fines, according to the council’s website.

CORRECTION: This article was updated at 10.05 on 21 Oct. 2024 to make clearer that it was drivers who parked the cars on the footpath, the cars did not park themselves. Apologies for using languate that obscured the role of the drivers.