Since the post offices closed in the rural Co Kildare villages of Moone and Narraghmore in 2018, people have had to travel by car for many postal services.
For some, the change has brought greater upheaval: the loss of places for people to meet in their community.
Nationally, An Post has been in the spotlight with last week’s public spat between Minister for Communications Patrick O’Donovan and An Post chief executive David McRedmond over the financial stability of the semi-State postal company and leaking of “utter garbage” claims, according to Mr McRedmond, about the company being on the brink of financial collapse.
At a local level, the future of the country’s post offices has been big community news for years in light of closures and this is felt particularly in south Kildare.
Over the last decade, 257 post offices have closed nationally, according to a reply to a parliamentary question tabled by Sinn Féin TD David Cullinane.
Moone, located on the old Dublin to Waterford road but bypassed twice over the years, lost its post office which was located in The Piers Cafe, a community meeting point. The closure shocked locals.
“It wasn’t making money,” says Noreen Kilrane, who runs the community cafe on a voluntary basis. “There was the shop, there were some groceries, there’s not a chance of being able to keep up with that. It was a huge blow.”
Kilrane says the shop still sells stamps and people can pay their bills and rent there, but An Post customers cannot avail of some postal services in the shop, such as withdrawing cash from their accounts.
“We do everything except give out money, but I suppose most people get their money into their account. We don’t get paid to provide those postal services, you might get 50 cent a package,” she says.
Local woman Suzanne Kiuchi says she can see how the post office closure would affect older people.
“Only for the community cafe, we would have nowhere to buy a litre of milk and then the social connection, it’s providing a lifeline for older people, including older men,” she says.
Kilrane adds that the cafe received funding and support from Kildare County Council and that it is a vibrant outlet for people locally.
The cafe is also providing the perfect antidote to rural and elderly isolation.
“What they [older people] lack is socialisation. They’re alone, growing up, they were talking to each other over ditches, going to post offices, to Mass. It’s because they’re alone, there’s a difference between being alone and being lonely,” says Kilrane.
“One older woman told me: ‘I’m so lonely I pray to God he’ll take me.’”
Now, according to Kilrane, the older woman has “managed to cross the age barrier” and is mixing with younger people at the cafe as well as with people of her own age.
A little over 5km north of Moone is the village of Narraghmore, where the post office closed in October 2018, less than a month after the Moone closure.
Local woman Kathleen Hickey (88), along with her daughter Teresa, ran the post office at the time of its closure. The family’s association with the service stretches back more than a century.
In 1965 Kathleen married James (Jim) Hickey, who in 1956 had taken over the post office from his father, Thomas. It had been transferred to Thomas in 1910.
Reluctantly, Kathleen and Teresa decided not to continue with the post office in 2018.
“It was missed,” says Kathleen.
In Narraghmore, the post office was as much a place for people to socialise as to avail of the services it offered, according to Teresa, who now works in Kildare Village.
“Sometimes when you got home, your head would be fried from talking to people all day. But now everyone is so isolated.
“I’ve no idea what’s going on, [but] before, you knew.”
