Minister for Transport, Paschal Donohoe has played down the possibility of work proceeding on the €850 million Cork-Limerick motorway, saying the project would be in competition with a number of other road upgrades for scarce resources.
Mr Donohoe said the upgrade of the Cork-Limerick road to motorway status was only one of a number of projects in Co Cork seeking funding for and any decision would be on the basis of which project offered best value and benefit to the region.
“The last time that the Cork to Limerick road project was evaluated from a funding point of view, the approximate cost of it was €800 million and what I need to do now is weigh the cost of that project up against the competing demands in the city and county of Cork alone.
“These include, for example, the need for investment in the Ringaskiddy Road, investment in the Dunkettle Interchange while I also have colleagues within the county of Cork pressing on me the need for investment in the Cork -Kerry Road.
“All of these are projects that cost money and I need to weigh all those up to ensure that whatever money is available to this government and the government that comes after it, is well spent to support the recovery that is underway in Cork in the most effective and efficient way possible.”
Mr Donohoe said he would be meeting with Cork Chamber and other interest groups as well as Oireachtas colleagues from Cork to hear their views on improving infrastructure in the county before making any decision on where funding was to be allocated.
Earlier this year, Minister of State Sean Sherlock told The Irish Times the N20 upgrade was essential for balanced regional development to ensure Cork and Limerick continue to grow as a counter weight to Dublin and the east coast.
Mr Sherlock conceded he didn’t see the full estimated €850 million being made available in the immediate future but believed it would be possible to re-activate the project and have some monies allocated to at least allow preparatory work be done on the planning process.
According to an informed source, a relatively small sum of €5 to €8 million would allow the preparatory work on planning to be completed but when asked about this, Mr Donohoe was reluctant to commit any funds to upgrading the Cork-Limerick road.
“As much as I would like to see projects like this go-ahead I can only give the go-ahead to money being spent on road projects if I am absolutely confident if the exchequer has available to them all of the funding they need to complete the project in its entirety,” he said.
Sean O’Neill of the NRA said earlier this year €150 million of the €850 million cost was allocated for land purchase with the remainder to be spent on planning and design, survey works, site investigation, archaeological examination, environmental mitigation measures and construction.
Mr O’Neill said the NRA had looked at a number of routes.
The selected route submitted for planning, east of Mallow and Buttevant but west of Charleville, would have required the compulsory purchase of 16 residences and a total of 905 hectares affecting 235 farms and approximately 247 other properties, Mr O’Neill told The Irish Times.
A motorway along this route would have involved the construction of 44 new road bridges, eight major river bridges, a number of smaller water crossings and two railway crossings, as well as 64kms of local roads including national, regional, local and private-access roads.
The motorway would extend for about 80km from the junction with the proposed Cork northern ring road near Blarney outside Cork city to the junction with the N21 at Attyflynn in Co Limerick and it would cut the travel time between Attyflynn and Blarney from 61 minutes to 45 minutes.
