Saintfield street hope

Saintfield street hope

3 July 2013

THE failure to progress one of the Province’s biggest ever roads schemes could benefit Saintfield.

Stormont Regional Development Minister Danny Kennedy was asked on Monday to consider making some of the £120m which the Executive had allocated for a major new road from Derry to Aughnacloy to be redistributed to upgrade Saintfield’s main street.

The case was made when Mr. Kennedy met with officials from the Saintfield Development Association, Down Council chairman John Dumigan and Strangford Assemblyman Simon Hamilton.

As a result of the talks, Mr. Kennedy agreed to work with Down Council to update the costings and scale of the work required at Saintfield main street.

Describing the meeting as “constructive,” Mr. Hamilton said he’s been working closely with the Development Association and Down Council for some time to bring forward a comprehensive redevelopment scheme for Saintfield’s main street.

He believes the town’s full potential as a place to live, work and visit isn’t being reached, suggesting one of the primary reasons for this is the poor state of the main road and pavement at this part of the town.

Several months ago, Down Council gave the green light for a new £4.5m community leisure facility in Saintfield and is working with the local community to improve the town square area and the provision of a new £1m play park. Mr. Hamilton said the “significance” of this investment is an illustration of the community working in partnership with local government to improve Saintfield.

But he’s worried this investment, whilst making a huge difference to the social and environmental fabric of Saintfield, will not allow the town to reach its “obvious potential” because the Main Street is still in such a poor state of repair.

Mr. Hamilton continued: “I invited Mr. Kennedy to visit Saintfield last November so he has seen for himself how bad things are.

“Those of us who met him on Monday thought it was opportune to do so because of the possible availability of money in the budget for capital schemes like Saintfield Main Street as a result of the failure to proceed with the A5.”

The Strangford MLA said the delegation made a firm case to Mr. Kennedy that if he and his Executive colleagues are looking for capital projects to invest in this year or in 2014, then Saintfield could usefully spend that money.

Mr. Hamilton added: “We made the point that the Saintfield community has shown a self-reliance, sourced funding for various schemes and been actively supported by Down Council. It’s now time for the Department of Regional Department and the Executive to support Saintfield with funds for the Main Street scheme which would transform the town and help it reach its potential.”