No Easy Path Ahead Warns Cliff Walk Report

Signs of the times…

oung Harris sent out a press release this afternoon, welcoming the publication of a new report addressing The Cliff Walk’s closure since February 2021 and how it could be reopened.

Alongside the standard lines about this much-loved amenity being much-missed, the Tánaiste acknowledged the report’s findings as worrying, stating that they ‘underline the scale of the challenge but also the need for urgency’.

Annoyingly, the bould Simon didn’t actually reveal any of the RPS Group’s findings in question. That was left to RTE, who said that the report was released following an appeal under Freedom of Information laws.

It doesn’t make for pretty reading, noting as it does multiple hazardous areas with fractured rock faces and loose stones along the path.

“In general,” the report states, “the entire cliff slope shows signs of landsliding. Meaningful remediation of the coastline regression in this area would require extensive coastal protection on the foreshore.”

There was evidence too of landslide scars that were visible but had yet to reach the path. It was noted that at one point there was a landslide to the beach 50 metres below, the report stating, “Such steep faces will collapse over time and undermine the walk”.

A rock fall near a railway tunnel was also highlighted, with other areas recognised as having similar vulnerabilities.

Local TD Jennifer Whitmore expressed her concern over this nationally important site, and the need for Government funding to assess and repair the walk, but recognised that “people’s safety is paramount, and if there’s information available that there’s a risk to walkers, it’s important that this is made publicly available as soon as possible.”

A spokeswoman for Wicklow County Council stated that the draft report was being reviewed by them and Iarnród Éireann, and their actions will be “assessed based on the final report findings”.

Friends of The Cliff Walk

Peter Murtagh from Friends Of The Cliff Walk feels this new report is old news.

“There is nothing new in this RPS report,” he tells the Guide. “It is merely an observational note, written last June, by an engineer who walked along the path from Bray to Greystones. He saw rocks on Bray Head that were cracked and coastal erosion above the Greystones north beach – in other words, what anyone who walks the walk can see for themselves. It is factual and does not deal with safety matters – contrary to a report on RTE.

“In 2023, another geotechnical report commissioned by Wicklow County Council identified what was needed to be done on Bray Head. But the Council did nothing. An interim solution exists to the land slippage problem on the Greystones, which the Council knows but is apparently not interested in. But this ‘do nothing’ approach by the Council is not sustainable.”

You can read the new report here, find out more about this much-loved trek through its history here and recent non-developments here.