Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

We cannot have land use planning without transportation planning along with it. They have to be consistent with each other. Going back to the Dublin transportation initiative, for example, it was an exercise in land use and transportation planning. The problem was that we did not get delivery on the transport side. What we got was the other developments without the transport aspect. Essentially, if we do not have both happening together what we will then have is a model that is entirely unsustainable. There must be symmetry. Some of this comes with funding. For example, the DART underground is critical not just for Dublin, but for the surrounding counties because it has a much bigger footprint. If it is not funded and some additional development is added, then a bad situation will be made worse. This is what is happening at present.

I had a look at the figures in the 20 year horizon to 2016 from when the plan was reported in 1996. I looked at the census population and the percentage increases. Essentially, Dublin city grew by 13%, Dún Laoghaire by 13%, south Dublin by 22%, Fingal by 43%, Meath by 44%, Kildare by 39% and Wicklow by 28%. What we are creating is a perfect doughnut. We are generating transport activity on the periphery to clog up the middle. If we do not have not only transport planning, but also transport delivery while we are developing, we will have chaos. We are seeing this being reinforced on the periphery of Dublin at present with the regional planning guidelines, which I think are out of sequence with, for example, the CSO's population prediction. Whether or not it is the right mechanism to have the regulator as an arbitrator, I absolutely agree there does need to be a connection between both. Otherwise we will continue to have this mismatch and we will continue to have chaos. That chaos costs money because it brings additional new demands for widening roads and new roads when, in fact, in this particular instance the response should be rail based.

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