The village that time forgot when it came to life's most basic need

About three miles across the fields, as the crow flies, is located one of the best pieces of infrastructure ever constructed in this country. It is a stretch of road which has been claimed to have brought Dublin and Galway closer together.

While the roar of the M6 motorway cannot be heard in the tiny village of Kilrickle, which was situated on the main Galway to Dublin road before the motorway was built, the locals can only envy the progress that has been made elsewhere.

The residents of this idyllic and superbly maintained village – with a school and church on one side and two pubs and a shop on the other – are justifiably frustrated with their lot. They have a right to be furious but the overriding emotions are ones of disappointment and dejection.

When motorists pass through Kilrickle, they can’t but admire how tidy it is and what a pleasant place it seems to be. But behind the buildings along what used to be the N6 indicates something from a time long forgotten.

The sight of gutters leading into concrete and metal tanks at the back of these buildings indicates all is not as it should be. In fact Kilrickle must be one of the few villages in the country which does not have a public running water supply.

Those of us of a certain age can still recall when fresh water from wells and village pumps had to be transported in bulk for domestic use. The arrival of the local group water scheme was ultimately welcomed with open arms as it signalled the end of this type of hardship.

However, the residents of Kilrickle and surrounding areas are still stuck in a time warp as regards their water supply and they have been unable to make any progress despite their best efforts.

But what is more deflating from their point of view is that they have been campaigning for a water supply for the best part of a quarter of a century without any success.

Various committees have been established, campaigning for the Government to approve funding for a water scheme to supply the village and some 130 houses in the locality which have to provide their own source of water.

The vast majority of home owners have their own wells from which they pump water into a tank. This water is then purified for drinking purposes. Those who do not have such a system in place simply buy bottled water at their local supermarket.

Campaigns for the provision of a group water scheme for Kilrickle have fallen on deaf ears, and while there were high hopes that this would be included in the most recent of Government announcements, the fact that they were excluded was a major disappointment to villagers.

Local campaigners have lobbied the four Galway East TDs on numerous occasions in recent years and even brought their campaign to the steps of Leinster House, and they are amazed that their plight has been continuously ignored.

For more, read this week's Galway City Tribune.