ALMOST a quarter of a billion pounds, the bulk of it Irish taxpayers money, is to be invested in county and regional roads this year, the Minister for the Environment announced yesterday.
Mr Howlin said the figure of £241 million - £172.8 million from the Exchequer and EU sources and a further £68 million from local authorities' own resources - would have been "unimaginable" a few years ago the equivalent expenditure in 1993 was just £77.3 million.
Announcing the 1997 allocation for non national roads, he said it would be enough to cover all this year's programme as well as 40 per cent of the priority schemes identified by county councils for 1998. This was "really making an impact" on the pothole problem.
The Minister took strong exception to a recent statement by the president of the ICMSA, Mr Frank Allen, complaining that nothing was being done in this area. "I was just appalled by it. He must have been totally oblivious of the scheme I launched in 1995," he declared.
Mr Howlin said the statement betrayed a "total lack of recognition of the progress being made" since he became Minister in December 1994. By the end of this year, "18 per cent of all the roads which have been neglected for a generation will be done".
Altogether, 7,600 kilometres of county and regional roads would be renewed during 1997, compared to 6,600km this year. He produced a graph showing that annual expenditure in this area had risen from £1,212 per kilometre in 1994 to £1,898 in 1997.
He also noted that the special restoration programme which he had inaugurated rose from £20 million in 1995 to £73.3 million last year and £93.3 million in 1927. Proportionally more regional roads, which were wider and therefore more costly, were being done this year.
Mr Howlin stressed that the grants being made to county councils had been allocated on a basis proportional to the extent of their road networks. Thus, Cork will receive the largest sum (£15.8 million), though his own county Wexford is doing well with £8.43 million.
This year's allocation was part of a 10 year programme aimed at upgrading all county and regional roads. By the end of next month, he expected to receive a county by county analysis of the condition of these roads.
The Minister said his aim was to put a programme in place that's going to deal with the genuine grievance of rural communities". Its effectiveness was also being monitored by the audit section of the Taoiseach's Department.
He would not comment on the recent High Court judgment in the Cavan potholes case to the effect that it was a statutory duty of the local authorities to find the required funds to maintain county roads. This decision by Miss Justice Carroll is being appealed to the Supreme Court.
