Analysis: An Bord Pleanála's approval for the new M3 motorway indicates that it is prepared to rubber-stamp major road schemes without examining alternatives, writes Frank McDonald, Environment Editor
Three years ago, the National Roads Authority (NRA) was presented with a classic example of lateral thinking. Given that the existing N2 and N3 national routes are just 12 kilometres apart, why not build one new motorway in between instead of replacing them with two new motorways?
The idea was put forward by the Ballinter Residents' Association in Co Meath, with the involvement of a retired civil engineer, Mr Alan Park. But it was dismissed by the NRA, largely because two years of design work had gone into the N2 and N3 projects.
The alternative route would have required a new junction on the M50, roughly halfway between the Blanchardstown and Finglas interchanges, as well as a new road link running towards the city-centre via Cardiffsbridge. The existing N2 and N3 would have been left to cater for local traffic.
Among the scheme's advantages were that only one new bridge would be needed to cross the River Boyne, all of the towns intended to be bypassed by the M3 and upgraded N2 would still get that relief from through-traffic, and there would be significant cost-savings in building just one new road.
This was too radical for the NRA. In its response, given in late 2000, it said that the counter-proposal was "not in accord" with the National Development Plan's objective to upgrade both the N2 and the N3. Clearly, it wasn't, as even the Ballinter Residents' Association accepted at the time: it was a new idea.
The NRA argued that the proposed junction on the M50 - located 1.7km from the existing N3 interchange and less than 2km from the N2 interchange - "would drastically affect operation and capacity on the already overloaded M50, with significant implications for safety". However, the gaps separating some of the existing junctions on the M50 are comparable. The distance between the notorious Red Cow interchange and the next junction at Ballymount is only 1.5km, while the distance between the junction north of Ballymun and the M1 interchange is just 2km.
Equally spurious was the NRA's argument that a new motorway between the N2 and N3 would "run through a landscape currently undisturbed by major road infrastructure, with potentially serious implications for communities, the environment and farm severance". The fact is that the new M3, approved this week by An Bord Pleanála, is largely a greenfield motorway, and its construction will have precisely the same effects. So will the upgraded N2, since it will not necessarily follow the existing alignment. Thus, the overall environmental damage will be double.
The M3 corridor chosen by the NRA contains no less than 141 archaeological sites and will be located just 1km from the Hill of Tara. This corridor is so sensitive that an archaeological report for the NRA said it was "not possible to suggest a preferred route" between Dunshaughlin and Navan.
One of the few credible arguments advanced by the NRA was that building a new link road between the proposed motorway and the city-centre would be contrary to the 1994 Dublin Transport Initiative's strategy, which generally opposed major new road schemes within the C-ring formed by the M50.
Another argument was that there would still be a need for a bypass of Ashbourne even if the alternative was adopted. This was accepted by the Ballinter Residents' Association, which also conceded that Dunshaughlin would have to be bypassed, too - even if most through-traffic used the new motorway.
There is no indication from An Bord Pleanála's order approving the M3 that the counter-proposal was seriously entertained during the course of its consideration of the NRA/Meath County Council scheme. That would have involved stepping outside its rubber-stamping role for major road projects. When asked yesterday to comment on the circumstances of the decision, the authority said that it did not comment on individual cases.
The board can only deal with the motorway schemes put before it by county councils, on the NRA's behalf. But since it assumed responsibility for dealing with road projects under the 2000 Planning Act, it has approved every one of them, subject to relatively minor modifications.
A total of 322 objections or submissions were made on the M3, including pleas by the Columban Fathers to save their publicly-accessible wooded demesne of Dalgan Park, near Navan.
One of the conditions specified by the appeals board was that two underbridges should be provided to allow for a reopening of the disused railway line between Navan and the Maynooth line at Clonsilla, as mooted by the Strategic Planning Guidelines for the Greater Dublin Area. But that may never happen.
