Additional €209m provided for road schemes

INFRASTRUCTURE: An extra €209 million above last month's estimate for the national roads programme was included in Mr McCreevy's Budget speech yesterday.The Department of Transport said that the additional money should allow up to five new projects to begin in 2003.

More innovative ways of funding the remainder of the roads programme are to be studied by a new working group which is to report to the Cabinet by January 31st next. The new National Development Finance Agency will also advise State agencies from next January on the best funding measures for infrastructural projects.

At €1.25 billion, the funding for the National Roads Authority (NRA) would have kept pace with the original €6.3 billion cost of the inter-urban roads programme as projected in the National Development Plan in 1999.

But the total figure of €6.3 billion has since been accepted by the Government as inadequate, given the scale of inflation in the construction industry - particularly in road-building - over the past three years.

While the NRA will proceed with 12 major schemes next year, a further 22 schemes have gone through the statutory planning process and are awaiting financing.

Speaking after the Minister announced his proposals yesterday, an NRA spokesman said that the authority would be re-examining its list of priority projects, but he could not say which schemes might benefit from the extra money.

The Irish Times understands that four major schemes which have high priority on the list of 22 are expected to be cleared for construction next year. These are: the Kinnegad/Kilbeggan/Kilcock motorway in the midlands; the Monasterevin bypass in Co Kildare; the Waterford city bypass; and the Dundalk western bypass, which is under judicial review. Transport sources suggested that the Naas Road widening and junction improvement scheme might be the fifth project to benefit, but they emphasised that this was only "speculation".

The Budget leaves intact the estimated subvention to CIÉ, which is in the order of €500 million "or about €10 million per week".