Dart underground deferred but Metro North to proceed

TRANSPORT:THE Dart underground project is to be deferred but provision has been made for Metro North along with a €500 million subvention for roads in Northern Ireland, under the four-year plan.

The plan will see capital spending on transport reduced by €437 million over the four years, while current spending is to be cut by about €132 million – starting with €32 million in 2011.

The National Roads Authority is to be merged with the Railway Procurement Agency. No major road schemes will start in 2012 and 2013, but those earmarked for 2011 will go ahead as planned.

Citywest Luas will open in 2011, but no new Luas lines will be started. Funding for regional and local roads over the period will amount to €1.045 billion, about half the level of the boom years, while the €1.82 billion earmarked for national roads is about one-third of previous years’ provisions.

Funding for road schemes in 2011 covers bypasses of Belturbet, Co Cavan, Longford and Tralee as well as improvements to Cork Southern Ring Road junctions. Public-private partnership schemes on schedule to start in 2011 include the M17/18 Gort to Tuam and the Newlands Cross/M11 project.

In the North, the State is committed to spending €580 million on roads. The payments started in 2009 and the project is to be completed in 2015. The department has confirmed future allocations will be made “in line with the agreed project milestones and payment schedule”.

The next payment, of about €13 million, is due in 2011 . Construction is to begin in August 2012 and end in July 2015. Any further spending on roads depends on finding alternative funding. Additional income from tolls would be based – as reported in The Irish Times in July – on tolling additional stretches of the M50 and applying a toll to the M9 motorway.

More funding for regional roads may be found by ending the ability of some drivers to avoid paying back tax by claiming vehicles were off the road. In future, a vehicle would have to be taxed whether it is “on” the road or not. This was first proposed by the Local Government Efficiency Review Group and the measure might net as much as €75 million a year.

Capital subvention for regional airports will be restricted to €2 million over each of the next four years, a cut of about €3 million annually, while support for regional air services will be cut by €5.5 million a year.