Motorway services hit by delays

DRIVERS WILL have to wait up to an extra year to use the first service stations along the nation's expanding motorway routes after the National Roads Authority (NRA) admitted a delay in the programme. The first three stations - two on the M1 and one on the M4 - are not expected to open until late 2010.

According to the NRA, securing planning permission for the projects has proved slower than expected. An Bord Pleanála has yet to approve the three projects which had already accrued delays pending the approval of regulations required by the Department of Transport.

According to the NRA, once planning permission is secured it will take a further eight months to sign contracts for design, construction, operation and financing. These contracts will be on a public-private partnership basis.

A spokesman for the NRA said the authority was taking steps to streamline the passage of the remaining nine projects through the planning process.

A total of 12 locations along the motorway network have been identified for service areas and the NRA is planning to have service areas on all inter-urban motorways by 2010.

Each service area will be required to offer food 16 hours a day and fuel and toilet facilities around the clock. They will also provide extensive parking and a Garda enforcement area.

Development of service areas has been controversial for the NRA, which had originally opted against them on safety grounds. The then transport minister, the late Seamus Brennan, was also concerned about the impact on small towns if all traffic remained on motorways.

However, in 2005 the NRA reconsidered this stance, not least because many of the benefits of bypassing small towns and villages would be lost if traffic was forced back into them for food and fuel and announced a plan for more than 20 service areas and unmanned rest areas.

The NRA has since changed its view again, opting against rest areas, citing concerns about "antisocial" behaviour at similar unmanned sites in other European countries. This decision has effectively halved the number of places on a motorway for a driver to safely stop.

Following this decision, the Road Safety Authority wrote to the NRA saying drivers, particularly lorry drivers, needed service and rest areas along major routes where they could stop to take a phone call, change driver, rest or use a toilet.

Fourteen firms applied to build and run the first three stations and four were shortlisted.