There are many great engineering feats across the world. The Pyramids. The Great Wall of China. The Hoover Dam. And now, proudly joining that list… The Invisible Night-Time Car-Destroying Humps of Liberty Square, Thurles car park.
Yes, nestled in the thriving town of Thurles; a place known for its culture, history, and increasingly, its ability to test a car’s suspension beyond factory specifications; two magnificent road humps have been installed in the new car park situated south of Liberty Square. Not just any humps. Extremely high humps.The kind that don’t slow traffic; they redefine it.
Picture the scene. It’s dark. You’re driving home. All is calm. Then suddenly, BANG. Yes you’ve just discovered one of Thurles’ newest attractions; “Guess Where the Hump Is.” No reflective paint. No triangular hazard markings. No “hazard teeth.” Not even a polite hint. Just raw, unfiltered suspense. In fact, the lack of proper road markings is not even new to the area, concerns have previously been raised that road markings around Liberty Square are confusing and unsafe. But why stop at confusing when you can go full invisible ambush?
Vehicle Undercarriage Adjustment Programme, (V.U.A.P.). Locals report that cars are now receiving what engineers are calling: “Unscheduled structural realignment.” Others might call it: “The exhaust is now optional.” Between these humps and existing road issues, Thurles is quietly becoming Ireland’s leading centre for :- Suspension stress testing; Shock absorber retirement schemes, and spontaneous undercarriage redesign. And if you think that’s dramatic consider this: Tipperary has already seen over €50,000 paid out in compensation for pothole-related vehicle damage in recent years.
So clearly, the strategy is evolving; If potholes don’t finish the job, the humps will. While Thurles boldly pioneers the construction of Everest-sized speed ramps, meanwhile, the Potholes Live On. Oh, the potholes are heritage sites now. Protected. Preserved. Possibly getting listed. Residents have long complained about roads in poor condition, with some routes described as “full of potholes” and “very poor” , and even “deplorable” in broader Tipperary reports.
But filling them? Ah no, sure that would be reckless. Why eliminate a pothole when you can simply install a hump nearby and let drivers experience both?
It’s about balance. Engineering Brilliance (Or Something Like It), so let’s admire the process:-
Build two extremely aggressive road humps ✔️
Forget the hazard markings ✔️
Leave them practically invisible at night ✔️
Place them where unsuspecting drivers will absolutely hit them ✔️
This is not a mistake. This is performance art. A bold statement on modern infrastructure. A physical metaphor for life in Thurles: “You won’t see the problem… until it hits you.”
Final Thought:- Add a scoreboard; Give out prizes for best airborne moment, and rebrand the car park as: “Liberty Square Adventure Zone”.
As we already stated on Tuesday last March 17th, Thurles was alive with atmosphere and community pride as the town celebrated St Patrick’s Day with a well-attended parade that brought people together from across the area.
Video: Courtesy G. Willoughby.
Despite cold and cloudy conditions, large crowds gathered along the streets of Thurles, creating a vibrant and welcoming scene throughout the day. Families, friends, neighbours and visitors turned out in great numbers, with a strong sense of occasion evident from beginning to end.
The parade was a fitting reflection of the spirit of Thurles and the wider mid-County Tipperary community. It showcased the town’s warmth, resilience and pride, while also highlighting the importance of St Patrick’s Day as one of the most significant dates in Ireland’s cultural and civic calendar.
People of all ages joined in the celebrations, lining the route in good spirits, applauding participants and embracing the event with enthusiasm. The day offered a strong expression of local identity and community togetherness, as residents and visitors alike came together to celebrate Irish heritage and shared belonging.
Thurles continues to be a thriving and proud town in County Tipperary, and this year’s St Patrick’s Day parade once again demonstrated the strong community values for which it is so well known. The lively crowds and positive atmosphere underlined the town’s reputation as a friendly, welcoming and united place.
The celebration was a reminder of the enduring importance of community events in bringing people together and strengthening local connections. In Thurles, St Patrick’s Day 2026 was marked not only with colour and festivity, but with a genuine sense of pride, unity and shared celebration.
Over 5,000 Speeding Offences Detected as Gardaí warn of ongoing road safety risks.
An Garda Síochána has described road safety compliance during the recent St Patrick’s bank holiday enforcement period as deeply disappointing, with more than 200 motorists arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs over the past seven days.
In Tipperary, within the past 7 days at least several arrests linked to drink- and drug-driving enforcement were reported during the St Patrick’s bank holiday period, including a drink-driving arrest in Cahir, a serious drink-driving incident in Cashel, and a suspected drug-driving arrest in South Tipperary.
Speaking on RTÉ Radio’s Morning Ireland, Superintendent Mr Liam Geraghty of the Garda Press Office said the provisional figures showed a troubling level of dangerous behaviour on Irish roads, despite widespread public discussion about road deaths, road safety, and increased Garda enforcement over the holiday period.
Superintendent Geraghty said the level of offending was especially concerning given the visibility of the Garda road safety campaign and the additional checkpoints put in place during the St Patrick’s operation.
Gardaí also expect that more than 5,000 drivers will have been detected speeding during the same seven-day period. According to Superintendent Geraghty, this represents a significant rise on the 2025 average of approximately 500 speeding detections per day, with the bank holiday weekend seeing daily detections exceed 700.
He highlighted one particularly serious example in which a vehicle was detected travelling at 112 km/h in a 50 km/h zone on the R183 in Monaghan, describing it as motorway speed on a small urban road in a built-up area.
Superintendent Geraghty said it was a major concern that, despite advance notice of increased checkpoints and enforcement activity, such high numbers of road users continued to take the risk of speeding or driving under the influence, placing themselves, their passengers, and other road users in danger.
He further noted that six people had died on Irish roads since the Garda road safety operation was launched the previous Wednesday at the Road Safety Conference in Killarney.
Referring to public attitudes, Superintendent Geraghty said there appeared to be a disconnect between what people say about road safety and how some behave in practice. He pointed to RSA survey findings indicating that 12 per cent of Irish motorists admit to driving under the influence of alcohol, while more than 25 per cent believe driving a short distance after drinking is acceptable.
Superintendent Geraghty also defended current Garda road policing resources, stating that 647 personnel are now assigned full-time to roads policing duties. He said this is the largest specialist area within An Garda Síochána and is supported by uniformed and plainclothes members across the organisation.
He added, however, that enforcement alone cannot eliminate dangerous driving, noting that even if every Garda member were deployed on the roads, there would still be many stretches without visible Garda presence. He said personal responsibility remains essential and urged all drivers to act safely for their own sake and for the safety of all road users.
Bournea Reaching Out Historical Society PRO Mr Tim Maher Reports:-
The Annual General Meeting of ‘Bournea Reaching Out Historical Society’ was held in Lismackin Hall on February 10th 2026 last. The outgoing Chairman Mr Tim Lee welcomed everyone to this their 13th AGM. He thanked everyone for attending the meeting in the Hall and on their videoconferencing application ‘Zoom’. He told the meeting that the club had yet another great year in 2025. He said they had commenced the year with the AGM in February by electing a new committee. Members had continued with very successful hybrid meetings and it has now become part of their normal meeting each month, over the past few years.
He stated that the club had a great visit to Cahir on their Historical Outing; visiting the Swiss Cottage and Cahir Castle, before meeting up with Mr PJ O’Meara from Cahir’s historical society, who took members on a tour around the town. Finishing in the square, the society went to the Cahir House Hotel where they had a meal, on what was described as a wonderful day, on probably the hottest day of the year.
This year they helped the Hall Committee, by applying for a grant under their name to purchase new tables for Hall.
Mr Lee went on to state, “We had a wonderful morning in Clonakenny at the Norebrook Lounge, when we invited the Tipperary Village Tours Tipp FM team, with Allison Hyland and John G O’Dwyer on Friday June 13th. They interviewed and recorded 12 speakers from all the groups in the parish, with music from Davie Brereton, Michael Ryan, and Michael Doyle. The program was later aired on Tipp FM. All interviews were subsequently transcribed for an article in our 2025 publication. Unfortunately, we didn’t have our annual Historical walk/drive this year, due to certain circumstances. We have done all the surrounding rural areas and maybe it’s time to look closer to home again, as it’s been nine years since we had a walk or drive in our own parish. Mr Paddy Coady launched our 12th volume of “Bournea Reaching Out Historical Society 2025” publication in the Norebrook Lounge. Another great achievement, and sold extremely well. Tim thanked all involved in producing this publication, from the authors to the sellers and many more involved. We also launched our website, which is a brilliant achievement, Tim thanked Emma for all her help to date. We have a lot of work to do with the webpages over the coming months but he had no doubt it will be a brilliant resource going forward. We continue to compile research like the Maher families, school, graveyard, memory card, and other historical data, etc. Our Facebook page and private GEDmatch Discussion group page on both on social media remains ongoing, helping to connect new people searching for their family history in different ways”.
Mr Lee further stated that in June, he submitted his resignation as Chairperson of Bournea Reaching Out Historical Society, with effect from tonight. He said he knew it was a bit of shock to the members and that is why after careful consideration he submitted his resignation last June, to give the society time to organize a new Chairperson. “It is time someone new took on the role and bring new ideas to the job and lead it maybe in a new and better direction for the benefit of our society”, he added.
Mr Lee said he had been Chairperson since their formation first in 2013 and during that time he was more than satisfied with what was achieved in that period. When we started, Mr Lee said he could never have imagined the number of projects the society would complete and that to lead this society into so many projects was indeed a great honour.
Mr Lee said that the proudest moment for him was receiving the Ireland XO Volunteer of the Year National award, on behalf of the society in 2015. This was a Government award, and Minister of State and Diaspora Affairs Mr Jimmy Deenihan and Mr Mike Ferick of Ireland XO presented the awards recognising that out of 500 parishes affiliated with Ireland XO that year, they were the most active, reaching out to the diaspora, who were researching their origins and, most importantly, ensuring that every returning member of the Irish diaspora was greeted with a welcome. Very few knew what we were doing outside the parish before then. That award gave Mr Lee great energy to lead the society at that time and look what they have achieved since. “We completed a lot of projects over the years and I didn’t think there was a year when we didn’t implement a significant project or event. Starting in 2013 with the setting up of Bournea Parish Group; the Ireland XO Presentation Night by Henry Healy; the Brief History of Couraguneen Graveyard booklet; all our lectures e.g. Willie Smyth when he packed the hall in 2014 and George Cunningham 2015, Joe Coughlan & Michael Ward 2016, DNA lecture by Tom Ryan 2018, Larry Breen and Rev. Mgr. Dr Maurice Dooley in 2020, the DNA Lecture by Professor Mark Kennedy 2021; first publication in 2014 to our last volume, 2025 (12 incredible publications); all our Book launches, launched by various distinguished people inside and outside the parish, including the Tipp FM Book Launch 2017; The unavailing of a plaque to Tom Delaney in Clonakenny village 2015. The Way we were project, bringing the Couraguneen Church Door back to life, the Commemoration of Toor to Loran in 2016; the school reunion and the outdoor way we were project in Clonakenny in 2017; all the historical walks mapped in our parish and reaching out to our neighboring parishes to do the walks and help them to record the history of their parishes; managing to continue during the Covid pandemic, by introducing different ways to communicate through Zoom meetings and WhatsApp; the sketch we did during Covid to promote the book in 2021; introducing the hybrid meeting in the hall; introducing the DNA GEDmatch Ancestor Project in 2022; the celebration of ten years in 2023; The Graveyard Projects over the years; the Ellis Island Project; digitizing the School Records; the opening of Jim Kennedy’s Castlepark Museum; and finally the new website we have launched in 2025, not forgetting the many smaller projects completed in the past 13 years that we have recorded in our publications.
Photo: Newly Elected Chairperson of Bournea Historical Society Ms Christine Timoney.
After The Chairperson’s address, Vice Chairman Mr Michael Costigan paid tribute to Mr Lee on behalf of the whole group. Mr Costigan said he had always a keen interest in local history and was delighted when Mr Lee asked him in 2012 to help him for a new historical group in the parish. Mr Costigan praised Mr Lee for his brain power and knowledge, as well as his patience and persistence. He said so much would have been forgotten, but those stories will now be handed down to the next generation. Researchers will be delighted with the books that we have published. He thanked Mr Lee for all his work and insight, and wished him health and happiness.
This was followed by the election of Officers 2026. Chairperson: Christine Timoney. Vice Chairperson:(Regional) Michael Costigan. Vice Chairperson:(Global) Anne Evola. Secretary: Ann Feehan. Assistant Secretary: Mary Conway. Treasurer: Dick Conroy. Public Relations Officer (PRO): Tim Maher. DNA Project Admin: Gail Hannigan
Committee Members were as follows: Paud Treacy, Aidan Lee, Michael Kiely, Hannah Greed Quigley, Nora Byrne, Margaret Maher, Philomena Hynes.
Newly elected Chairperson. Our new Chairperson, Christine Timoney lives in the city of Melbourne in Australia. She attends our meetings via Zoom every month. Christine Timoney first joined Bournea Reaching Out Historical Society in 2014 when she rented a traditional Irish cottage in Killough for four months from July to early November. The goals of her extended visit from Australia were to experience something of what it might be like to live in rural Ireland, and to reconnect with four distinct lines of Tipperary ancestors.
On one of those four lines, Christine’s maternal grandfather John Costigan left Borrisnoe for Australia in 1882, arriving as a 19-year-old in Sydney with his sister Mary Anne. They were followed seven years later by two more sisters Annie and Hannah.
John Costigan later moved on to Brisbane where in 1901 he married Honorah McMahon of Portroe. The youngest of their children was Christine’s mother Mary Costigan, born 1909. John Costigan died in Brisbane over one hundred years ago, on 30th July 1925.
Like many nineteenth century Irish emigrants, John and his sisters left more brothers and sisters behind in Ireland, and Christine feels very blessed to have reconnected in 2014 with her extended Costigan-Maher family, a great many of whom still live here.
Throughout her childhood Christine was entranced by exotic-sounding place names like Borrisnoe and Devil’s Bit Mountain, and now, having repeatedly achieved her dream of walking in her ancestors’ home places, she has stepped into the role of chairperson – from afar – of Bournea’s vibrant and active historical group. The group now boasts members from across the parish, elsewhere in Ireland and across the world. Their meetings are hybrid: every month the locals meet in Lismackin Hall while others Zoom into the meeting from Ireland, USA and Australia.
At the group’s recent AGM, Christine paid tribute to their impressive thirteen years of achievements under the inspiring leadership of founding chairperson Mr Tim Lee, and pledged to continue the many successful annual projects, including the publication of a fresh volume of Bournea history every year, the popular historical walk/drive each summer, the public history lecture and the members’ annual excursion to places of historical interest.
This year she also hopes to oversee significant progress in oral history interviews with long-time local senior residents,enhancements to the newly launched Bournea website and a thorough study of the movement of families into, out of and within the parish in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. For this last project, the group keenly awaits the release of the 1926 census of Ireland, which will be freely available online from 18 April.
Christine pays tribute particularly to the group’s resilience in adapting to the challenges of the pandemic in 2020 and is grateful that their response was to go hybrid with their meetings. This has created a unique environment for cooperation and collaboration between local residents passionate about history and genealogy, and like-minded descendants of Bournea emigrants who moved to othercountries over the past couple of centuries.
Christine thanks Bournea Reaching Out Historical Society for offering her this unique opportunity to make a difference from afar.
Fresh figures showing compensation paid to motorists for pothole damage underline the continuing burden poor road conditions are placing on drivers across county Tipperary.
Tipperary County Council has paid out €50,105 in compensation for pothole-related vehicle damage since 2023. While this is below the very highest totals seen elsewhere in our emerald isle, it still places Tipperary among the more significant local authority payouts and points to a persistent problem on our counties roads.
These figures must be seen in the wider national context. Local authorities paid approximately €1.3 million in compensation to motorists over the past three years for pothole-related damage. That is a serious cost to the public purse, but it is also a direct cost to families, workers and business owners, latter who rely on safe and passable roads every day.
What is particularly concerning in Co. Tipperary is that the claims issue does not appear to be isolated or short-term. Council management reports have shown an ongoing stream of pothole claims during 2024 and 2025, reinforcing the view that this is a recurring roads maintenance issue, rather than a once-off spike.
There is also concern that some motorists feel they were deliberately ignored or did not receive adequate responses, after raising road damage issues. That only adds to public frustration. When people take the time to report hazardous road conditions or seek redress for damage caused, they are entitled to clear communication, fair treatment and timely follow-up.
It is important to state that councils are not automatically liable for every pothole-related incident. In general, compensation arises where there is evidence of negligence or where repairs or interventions may have been carried out to an insufficient standard. However, that makes it all the more important that repairs are durable, properly inspected and carried out before defects worsen and place more motorists at risk.
The real issue here is not only compensation after the fact. The real issue is prevention. Tipperary needs a stronger and more proactive road maintenance programme, faster response times to reported defects, better quality control on repairs, and greater transparency for the public on how complaints and claims are handled.
Real Costs of getting behind the wheel of a vehicle here in Ireland. Irish motorists continue to face an escalating financial burden, with basic motoring-related taxes and charges estimated to generate some €6.2 billion annually for the State. From high fuel costs driven by excise duty, carbon tax, VAT and additional levies, to Vehicle Registration Tax and annual motor tax, drivers are contributing at every stage of car ownership and use. On top of these standard charges, motorists must also absorb insurance levies, tolls, NCT fees, parking charges and a growing range of fines and penalties for road traffic and parking offences, all of which add to the overall cost of getting behind the wheel. Yes, and I haven’t mentioned property tax which is partially associated in housing same vehicle. While electric vehicle owners currently benefit from reduced rates in some areas, concern is mounting that further measures, including a proposed weight-based tax on heavier vehicles such as SUVs, could place even more pressure on drivers in the years ahead. Motorists should therefore not be left paying the price for road failures that could and should have been addressed months earlier.
Motorists are calling on Tipperary County Council to:
prioritise lasting repairs on known problem routes,the streets of Thurles town being one neglected area
improve response systems for motorists reporting potholes and road damage,
ensure all complainants receive timely acknowledgement and follow-up,
publish clearer local data on pothole complaints, repairs and claims outcomes.
People across Tipperary deserve safer roads, better accountability, and a council response that is effective, transparent and fair.
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