The first of 43 National Car Testing Service centres is to be opened in Athlone, Co Westmeath, today. Trial testing of cars more than eight years old is to begin at the Kilmartin centre on the N6 Dublin-Athlone road.
The National Car Testing Service has been awarded a contract by the Department of the Environment and Local Government to carry out statutory testing from next January of 440,000 cars registered before 1992. Drivers who cannot produce a certificate showing that their cars have passed the roadworthiness test will be unable to tax them.