Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this important motion. I welcome its introduction. As the Minister knows, public transport is a rare species in the west of Ireland. We know all about it. I listened to some of Deputy Bríd Smith's comments about a 24-hour service and thought how happy people in parts of rural Ireland would be with a five-hour service.

There are many things I could say about the rights and wrongs of public transport. In my constituency, many people travel from the east and north of the county to work in the city. Every day, approximately 40,000 cars pass through Claregalway, trying to get into the city. As we know, the situation in respect of the city's outer ring road has now gone back in time. We have spent more than €32 million doing nothing other than creating paperwork. We have to ask what in the name of God we are doing about transport in our own areas.

I will give the Minister a small example. Back in 2007, the then Minister for Transport, Noel Dempsey, opened a bus lane between Loughgeorge and Claregalway. The plan was to build a bus lane from there into the city. The bus lane did not require the acquisition of any land. The space is there between the two walls and the road. Everything is fine. Lo and behold, we are almost into 2023 and we still do not have a word as to when this bus lane will be provided. The NTA has not got on with the job in all those years. Private bus operators are trying to get people into work but the buses are sitting in the same traffic as the cars. There is no real incentive for commuters to get out of a car and into a bus if they are left sitting in the same traffic. I do not know why that bus lane has not been provided. We get reports, research, feasibility studies and everything, but we get nothing at the end of the day.

There is much to be done for public transport in rural Ireland. There is an enormous amount of work to be done with Local Link, creating services that connect to the bigger operators and connecting them in a timely way so the Local Link bus can meet the bus going into Galway, or wherever else, and so the buses going into towns will meet the trains.

Speaking of trains, the Minister knows that we had a great conference in Tuam on Saturday at which we discussed investment in the west of Ireland. The conference was organised by West-On-Track. We have a campaign to reopen the line on the western rail corridor, under phases 2 and 3, to join Claremorris to Tuam and on to Athenry. The intention is to create a corridor of rail infrastructure that will help us deliver our carbon targets in respect of rail freight and passengers. We know that the line from Galway to Limerick is the fastest growing passenger line in Ireland. At the conference on Saturday, people were talking about crowded trains with people sitting on the floors of carriages. It is working, despite the fact that Irish Rail has not put on the proper schedules that were intended for phase 1 of the line.

I welcome the fact that we are putting in a passing loop in Oranmore to create more opportunities to get trains in and out of the city. Galway station is right in the heart of the city. It is well located to be of help to the city but we seem to be dithering about it and I am not sure why. If we are going to change the transport landscape from a political point of view, we have to start with the jobs we can do. Phase 2 and 3 of the western rail corridor is a project that is shovel-ready. It is ready to go. I know that the Minister of State and many of his colleagues support it. In fact, 110 Deputies and Senators in these Houses support the project so we will continue to work on it . We need to ensure that we do not leave anything to chance and that we get these projects delivered.

While I am talking about the rail service, I must note that there are bus services which are being cut out, for example between Gort and Limerick. Bus services were taken out of Kilreekill and the bus stop was removed from there. There are many mixed messages being delivered at the moment with public transport in Galway and further afield. If we are going to make life easier for people who are travelling to work in Galway, we need to grasp this nettle. We must ensure we provide a form of public transport which people can and will use, and provide the frequency it deserves and the people in the west of Ireland also deserve.

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