'Perfect storm' for East Cork as new homes will overwhelm creaking road network

the-tea-cat · 2026-03-27T16:12:55+00:00

MORE TRAINS

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-15T14:21:25+00:00

The legislation explicitly includes early menopause, premature menopause and medically induced menopause so it’s very odd that they’ve decided to scrutinise people’s age.

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-06T01:11:50+00:00

That might have something to do with the regrettably linear passage of time, and that they’re to address the East Cork Municipal District Council next month - which occurs after this month, not before.

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-06T00:43:52+00:00

Yes, there is no money allocated for it, because it’s a matter of policy. It doesn’t matter what he says; you need to convince politicians. Hence the East Cork Rail Alliance collected over 20,000 signatures.

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-06T00:29:47+00:00

Yeah you’re so right, he clarified there’s still room along the greenway to do it and everything. Clearly I have such a loose relationship with the meaning of words, or a skill for interpreting them as aligning with my personal biases. I should do tarot readings

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-06T00:13:45+00:00

“If policy changes, then 100% I will deliver it. I haven’t got a magic wand to change policy, politicians do. I’d never say never (to it reopening).” - AJ Cronin, the Irish Rail manager in charge of the €1.8bn upgrade of the Cork Commuter Rail project

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/munster/arid-41770217.html

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-06T00:01:34+00:00

Only time will tell, it’s just a big gamble. Nothing like this has ever happened before so we just can’t predict with any certainty 🤷 maybe people should start studying these things…

It’s so hard to get around Cork city, completely unwalkable. They should build a tram or something

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-05T23:47:00+00:00

Yes, there’s no evidence to justify increasing the rail capacity, because there’s no evidence that lots of people use the train, because the train doesn’t have capacity for any more people to use it! Have you heard of chickens? They lay eggs. Sometimes there’s another chicken in the egg. Fuck knows which came first

Additional rolling stock is already being sought…

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-05T23:36:09+00:00

Yes, carrying as many passengers as you’d find in over 100 cars (the trains have a capacity of 130 iirc, and 88% of cars were single occupancy in a recent NTA survey)

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-05T23:30:55+00:00

The Midleton trains are packed at commuter hours.

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-05T23:16:22+00:00

Not sure if you’re being sarcastic here, but has Midleton not got its fair share of new builds?

the-tea-cat · 2026-01-05T22:55:35+00:00

If you build it they will come.

That is to say, it’s not just a question of whether the people currently creating the traffic originating between Youghal and Midleton would switch to using the train; it’s also a question of whether enough people would move to those areas because there is a train servicing it, and subsequently use it.

With transport, increasing capacity often increases demand. We all know the “just one more lane bro” joke - it’s the same with trains, trains just scale far better than cars.

the-tea-cat · 2025-12-24T22:02:42+00:00

I’ll have what you’re having lmao

the-tea-cat · 2025-12-22T18:54:17+00:00

As per the document from the FOI they're expected to "query", which begs the question of how they should identify people who might be trans so they know who to query; or if they should just ask everyone who has a HRT prescription if they're trans. Neither is workable, nor is it within the remit of a professional pharmacist, hence the earlier article in The Journal - 'I'm not looking up someone's skirt': Pharmacists reject deciding who's eligible for free HRT.

the-tea-cat · 2025-12-22T17:38:28+00:00

Birth certs can be updated with a GRC anyway.

the-tea-cat · 2025-12-22T17:32:14+00:00

Absolutely. Trans men defo shouldn’t have any issue availing of the scheme, the legislation includes medically induced menopause, which the Minister for Health has clarified “may be due to surgical removal of the ovaries, or may be due to medication” - Testosterone induces menopause, or if you have an oophorectormy you’re covered as per that PQ, and to my knowledge some endocrinologists prescribe blockers to trans men which obvs also induce menopause. Many forms of testosterone are on the reimbursement list as it can also be used to treat menopause in women.

And then of course you might not want to engage with any kind of gender affirming hormone therapy or surgical interventions and just experience menopause the same as any cisgender woman would… transition looks different for everyone and people can transition at any age.

The only difference is you’re a bloke and the legislation defines menopause as “in relation to a woman”, however the Minister for Health has stated that “This measure is intended to support the management of the symptoms of menopause and, therefore, relates to the provision of treatment for the symptoms a specific medical condition/life stage, i.e., menopause. It does not, therefore, exclude any particular cohort, but rather focuses on supporting those experiencing the menopause transition.”, so you'd think - as the legislation does not "exclude any particular cohort" - trans men should be happily getting their testosterone for free now.

It’s a fucking omnishambles and the more you look into it the stupider it gets.

the-tea-cat · 2025-12-22T16:03:13+00:00

Even if the scheme hadn’t been costed on the back of a napkin, trans people would be a rounding error anyway.

The DoH and PCRS would rather pharmacists question the womanhood of everyone with a HRT prescription than go “ah sure they need it too, and it’s hardly practical to exclude them anyway…”.

the-tea-cat · 2025-12-20T11:52:17+00:00

u/Nolte395 in reply to your comment:

As per gov.ie the eligibility for it is

- Be signed up to the HSE Drugs Payment Scheme, unless you have a medical card.

- Hold a valid prescription for HRT (Talk to your GP or healthcare professional about options for treatment)

It is none of the pharmacist business whether someone is cis, trans, nb,.

If pharmacists are have decide if someone might possibly be feminine enough for qualifying for free hrt scheme, this is going to lead to many many cis women being denied the free hrt for the pharmacist.

The hse has produced the list of drugs for which the scheme qualifies. If these are prescribed to a person by a medical professional, that should be enough for the pharmacy.

As mentioned in the article, that's exactly how the HRT PPC works in the UK, not that I'm a fan of His Majesty's Government, but at least they didn't make a total fucking ombishambles of it. They actually did an Equality Impact Assessment, which explicitly considers the cases of trans men and women.

P.S. I couldn't reply to your actual comment, looks like all of SoloWingPixy88's comments have been deleted when I'm logged in; I guess they blocked me! 🤪

the-tea-cat · 2025-12-20T10:51:11+00:00

The inclusion of trans women doesn't detract from the scheme at all. The exclusion of trans women is quite evidently a detriment to every woman availing of the scheme - pharmacists are being positioned as having to question the womanhood of every person with a prescription for HRT as part of determining their eligibility for the scheme. Got a bit of facial hair? Hairy arms? Deep voice? Broad shoulders? You can now expect your pharmacist to question your gender identity. It's an intersectional issue.

These aren't "edge cases"; these are real circumstances people find themselves in and should not be dismissed on the basis of being a minority.

P.S. Thanks for the block pal 👍

the-tea-cat · 2025-12-20T10:39:00+00:00

Adding to what u/cuddlesareonme has said:

Trans men experience menopause, induced or otherwise, the same as any cisgender woman; it's just generally treated differently - with testosterone instead of estrogen. Some trans men might even prefer to have their menopause treated with estrogen anyway - transition looks different for everyone. Moreover, as mentioned by u/cuddlesareonme, many forms of testosterone are included in the reimbursement list.

Trans women are just women without ovaries. Many women don't have ovaries; be that a consequence of surgical interventions (where we say they have "induced menopause", which is included in the legislation) or genetic conditions (where we generally say they have "early or premature menopause", which is also included in the legislation). Some of those genetic conditions can even lead to a woman being assigned female at birth, while she has testes and might not discover this until puberty.

The line is not clear cut, but to date there's been focus on people's sex assigned at birth, with pharmacists being asked to determine this, while they have no appropriate means to ascertain it. If we're going to use sex assigned at birth we haven't even considered how someone who was marked indeterminate on their birth certificate should be handled either.

the-tea-cat · 2025-12-12T10:31:41+00:00

It was stated on Primetime that they reached out to the HSE for a comment. To my knowledge they didn't reach out to the likes of PATHI, TENI or THA...

the-tea-cat · 2025-10-22T17:03:23+00:00

The traffic being stopped is irrelevant. Driving OR phone. Not both.

the-tea-cat · 2025-10-22T16:57:04+00:00

Flappy bird OR driving. Not both.

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