Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Senator Craughwell mentioned my knowledge of the country. I was fortunate to spend 15 years driving around the country bringing people on holidays and that gave me knowledge of many different areas, including Cork city, which I know well. The Senator is right that the centre of the city is key. Cork has been hollowed out, like so many Irish cities, but it is probably the worst of them. John Spillane had a song that went "Johnny don’t go to Ballincollig ... Johnny don’t go to Carragaline" but everyone went out and we need to bring them back in. That is how one gets cities that attract investment and that work in a variety of different ways.

Cork has its problems with flooding as it is low lying - we all know that - but it is also stunning. Oliver Plunkett Street just won a big award as best street. It is a fantastic city. The critical decision we need to make is at the local council level. As an example of something that would do exactly what the Senator is suggesting, I will take one bus corridor route in Cork. From Ballincollig it would go through CIT and back by the hospital, down Wilton Road, the Western Road, pass by UCC, Washington Street, the Grand Parade and the South Mall and then out to the docks. That would not just service the docks and Mahon. It would service the centre. That will require difficult political decision-making, similar to the decisions we are about to make in Dublin.

In Dublin, we are en route to delivering BusConnects and getting it through planning. We also need to deliver a BusConnects for Cork. It was difficult when we started that project. The very first stage was on Wilton Road on that key section near the old greyhound stadium and the hospital. The local council said "No" to the project. It probably had good reasons because the locals on that street would lose some of the their front gardens, similar to parts of Dublin. We need to come back with a different solution. We need to look at that section of the road and decide to restrict through traffic, make it one way, use a bus gate or use the innovative methods we have now developed in Dublin, using the NTA to deliver them in Cork. We need that bus corridor because we need to revive the Grand Parade, Oliver Plunkett Street and Patrick Street, through which that route goes. We are starting. I understand that the council is working on turning the South Mall around as the centre of the business district. The docklands are starting to take off. The plan is viable but it requires the local authority to work with my Department by being ready and keen to do this and by providing the political direction to give the road space to really go with the sustainable transport solutions.

As the Senator knows, the bus service in Cork is not up to standard and it does not have the same advanced plans that there are in Dublin. Bus Éireann and the bus companies are up for it and they will do it but political leadership is needed at a local level to say we are going to go with Cork sustainable transport systems, which will revive the centre more than anywhere else.