BYCATRIONA GALLEN
IN the early hours of last Sunday morning a St Johnston couple were rudely awakened by a car crashing into their garden. It was 2am and the final straw for Philip and Annie Lynch who have lost count of the number of cars careering into their garden over the years.
The Lynch family home nestles in the corner of a left hand bend at Castletown on the outskirts of St Johnston. The local school is only a few hundred metres up the road.
Annie and Philip married and moved into their home 43 years ago. Since then dozens of cars have crashed into the garden, including a track digger and lorry jacks which have wrestled free from the back of passing lorries and bounced into their lawn. No sooner have Annie and Philip finished repairing their garden or hedge row than another vehicle will come crashing through all their hard work. Now in their 70s the couple have decided enough is enough. Annie has been in touch with the Council about the dangerous bend five times over the last year. She was promised an engineer would visit last summer but is still waiting.
In the past year four cars have ended up in their garden. One crashed through their fir tree hedge on Christmas Eve. Three short weeks later another crashed through the hedge at the lower end of the garden. In the summer a third car crashed on to the lawn and last Sunday a fourth vehicle came through the hedge, ruining months of replanting and repair work.
"It's a miracle no-one was ever hurt. We didn't bother reporting all the crashes to the Gardai, as long as everyone was okay we repaired the damage ourselves but this past year has been too much. The Council should put up some warning signs or cats-eyes, or something. Each time I go out to cut the grass now I'm taking my life in my own hands and it's all getting too much for the pair of us," explained Annie.
"One car which crashed into the garden in the summer time had nine people on board including a baby. We went out to check but they simply reversed out and drove off down the road."
With three gaping holes in their hedge the couple say the problem has become worse since they took away a tree next to the gate. "The tree had been hit so often it was in danger of falling over so we removed it but since then more and more people have ended up in our garden. We spent months repairing the damage done at Christmas to have it undone again in the summer, fixed and ruined again," said Annie.
The couple still have a hydraulic lorry jack which bounded into the garden two years ago from the back of a lorry. The bread van and neighbours have all crashed into the lawn. Their son Liam also had a lucky escape as a young boy when a track digger crashed off the back of a flat bed lorry and lodged at the bottom of the garden.
"The driver was at the school before he noticed the digger was missing. A piece came lose and landed at the far side of the house. Luckily Liam was at the back of the house playing. It's simply a matter of time before someone is seriously hurt. Each time I cut the grass, Philip puts out cones and warning signs on the road to get people to slow down, it's that dangerous," said Annie.
In a statement issued this week, Mr Patrick Gillespie, Area Roads Manager, said four chevron signs have been ordered to be erected at the corner. The signs had now been received and would be erected in the near future. He also stated that the County Council is not responsible for any damage caused to private property adjacent to the public road and repair work is a civil matter to be resolved between the person causing the damage and property owner.
"Following a complaint about incidents of cars colliding with Ms Lynch's front wall an engineer from the Letterkenny Roads Office did examine the location and was accompanied by the local Roads Services Supervisor. The engineer was unaware that he was expected to call with Ms Lynch and did not do so as he was fully briefed by the Roads Services supervisor," the statement concluded.
