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

This section provides for the amendment of section 13 of the Roads Act 1993, which deals with responsibilities of road authorities for the maintenance and construction of public roads. We are inserting a new section 13(7A), which will allow a road authority the power to carry out works to reduce, increase or modify specified items within an existing road or forming part of a road, which may be necessary for the reconfiguration of the road. This is essential for the BusConnects project, given the need for core bus corridors, which will require the power to reconfigure some roads.

Section 13(8) is being amended to clarify the powers of the road authority in relation to works on, in, under, or over a road and provides clarity regarding the position on changes to pipes or other similar infrastructure that may currently be considered to be under the road, rather than forming part of the road. This section updates section 13(8) to allow for any structure or infrastructure to be provided on, in, under or over a road, including for the charging of electric vehicles and the provision of information to road users.

The amendments simply reflect the existing practice in relation to maintenance and improvement of public roads and the installation of infrastructure beneath public roads. The items listed in this amendment to 13(8) are those required to be undertaken in relation to BusConnects and in respect of which there appears to be a current gap in terms of spelling out these powers of a road authority to undertake these works, which exist as a matter of course for other undertakers.

The insertion of a new subsection (11) provides that subsection (10) of section 13 of the Roads Act will not be applicable to the NTA when it is exercising the powers of a road authority in accordance with the Dublin Transport Authority Act 2008. Section 13(10) provides that a road authority can give consent to a person to undertake specific actions in relation to a road, subject to such conditions, restrictions or requirements as the road authority thinks fit.

Given that the authority is exercising the powers of a road authority in accordance with subsection (2)(b) or (5)(a) of section 44 of the Dublin Transport Authority Act 2008, but is not a road authority, it was considered that section 13(10) should not apply to the NTA, as to apply that section could lead to the authority having to apply to the road authority for consent.

Amendment No. 64 deletes "mitigating" and substitutes "taking any measure whatsoever that may be reasonably required to mitigate, directly or indirectly,". It gives the NTA and the BusConnects team responsible for delivery greater flexibility in the measures they take. I dealt with that at some length in the description I gave.