Recreational Connectivity Link between Woodstock Estate and the South East Greenway – Feasibility Study & Route Selection Report

Tender description

Trail Kilkenny has identified the need to engage the services of an engineer led design team to provide a design solution to deliver a safe cycle and walking facility for visitors and communities that connects Woodstock Estate in Instioge, Co. Kilkenny, with the new South East Greenway between New Ross and Waterford City. The South East Greenway (hereafter Greenway), which will be 24 km’s in length, runs along the disused railway line from Mount Elliott in New Ross, Co. Wexford, through the scenic countryside of South Kilkenny to Abbeylands, Waterford. In Waterford a link is being constructed which will connect this section of the Greenway with the well-established Waterford Greenway. Key features along the Greenway just northeast of the band of interest, for the subject brief, include the 600m long Mount Elliott tunnel and the Red Bridge river crossing over the River Barrow. The anticipated opening date of the Greenway is Autumn 2023. The Greenway will ultimately form part of a longer greenway from St. Mullins in Carlow to the Waterford Greenway and Dungarvan. (From St. Mullins long distance cyclists / walkers can follow the River Barrow to Kildare and then the Grand Canal to Dublin). In addition, subject to the outcome of the Government’s Strategic Rail Review, it is also intended the Greenway will connect to the proposed Rosslare Harbour to Waterford Greenway at Ferrybank in Waterford, therefore providing the South East with the most extensive network of Greenway in Ireland. The Nore Valley Walk currently exists between Kilkenny City and Bennettsbridge and Thomastown and Inistioge and is in the main a riverbank off-road trail. A feasibility study to connect the central section between Bennettsbridge and Thomastown will be progressed in 2022. Subject to the delivery on this objective, the overall aspiration is to connect Kilkenny City with the South East Greenway Network via the Nore Valley Walk and Woodstock Link.