Shane Ross (Dublin Rathdown, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Cork would be lucky if it could benefit from mistakes made by Dublin. Some of our proposals for Dublin, like BusConnects, will not be mistakes. They will be extended to Cork and other cities as well. They will have a dramatic effect in moving people out of their private cars and onto buses. That is the intention for Cork and Dublin and the vision for the entire country. I should say that the strategy referred to in the Deputy's question is a 20-year plan. It does not promise some sort of panacea which will sort out the traffic problem in Cork in the short term. We have a real challenge in Dublin, Cork, Galway and other cities which we cannot solve by simply waving a magic wand. We have laid out in our answer our plans for buses, which would cost €545 million. Our plans for heavy rail will cost €274 million; active travel will account for €220 million; light rail will account for €1 billion; and roads will amount to €1.39 billion. That is a serious commitment to Cork in the long term.

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