Mr. Niall Cussen:

It is probably more a matter for our colleagues in the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. I think that some of the investments we have made, for example, that motorway link, are made as much for the economic development piece - the long term - rather than asking whether that is the busiest stretch of road in the country right now. As the Chairman knows, there are infrastructure projects that would probably have a higher priority in terms of pressure of demand but it is a question of where that fits in an overall strategy. Finding ways to better connect our regional cities, particularly those on the western seaboard, was very much a key part of the spatial strategy back in 2002 so that they could present the economic and jobs catchments that could be seen as a credible complement to the Dublin area. IBEC and others have pointed out that where there is a labour force catchment of a million people that is broadly within an hour of getting to each other, productivity and innovation capacity increase markedly. Distance and time are the enemies of that kind of economic critical mass, which is why the M17 project is a very important step in realising the potential of two regional cities on the western seaboard - Limerick and Galway. Although these cities are very dynamic in their own way, they now have a new impetus behind them. That is something we must look at in terms of other regional cities in the context of the planning framework.