NRA insists roads plan has cut journey times

The National Roads Authority (NRA) has rejected allegations its spending of €1.5 billion has resulted in a time-saving of just 20 minutes between Dublin and the provinces.

The authority was responding to a report in The Irish Times yesterday which quoted a new report to the effect that the delivery of new roads was significantly behind schedule. The confidential report was submitted to the Department of Transport by economic consultants Indecon.

However, the roads authority corporate affairs spokesman, Mr Michael Egan, insisted it "simply is not true" that zero minutes had been shaved off journey times between Dublin and Galway, Limerick, Waterford or Cork, following road improvements.

Mr Egan said anyone who travelled regularly to Galway would remember the long delays at Kinnegad, Co Westmeath, which had been eliminated, and similar delays which had been eased at Enfield, Co Meath, through the provision of relief roads.

The Dublin-Galway route is being replaced by a new motorway, but journey times had already been cut by up to half an hour by the measures taken. Other works such as the new Celbridge interchange had also helped. Similarly, on the M/N7 Dublin-Limerick route, he said, the opening of the Nenagh bypass had taken traffic out of Nenagh town, eliminating another significant bottleneck.

On the N8 Dublin-Cork road, the Watergrasshill bypass was now open and a time-consuming bottleneck eliminated there, too. Improvements at Moone and Granagh on the Waterford road also cut journey times.

The Indecon consultants had indicated no time saving on the Dublin ring road, the M50. This, however, ran contrary to the experience of motorists since the Southern Cross Route Motorway was completed as far as Ballinteer in 2001, said Mr Egan.

The consultants also indicated a saving of just 20 minutes on the route from Dublin to the Border, a figure described by Mr Egan as "conservative".

While Mr Egan said he would "take issue" with the findings of zero time improvements on the inter-urban routes, the authority was concerned to point out that the road-building programme was not significantly behind schedule. The target for its completion, at the current mid-term stage, was about 31 per cent of the programme. It now stands at 29.5 per cent. The statistics are expected to improve in the coming months as the Kildare bypass opens four months ahead of schedule, and other schemes come on stream.

Mr Egan said the Indecon report was commissioned by the Government to assess the mid-term performance of the Economic and Social Infrastructure Operational Programme of the National Development Plan. While the authority questioned the findings on time savings, most of the report was "positive" in terms of its assessment of the roads programme, he said.