Gino Kenny (Dublin Mid West, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

People Before Profit welcomes and will support this motion. The A5 should have been completed a long time ago. One reason it has fallen behind is that, both North and South, environmental issues were not given any priority in the original design of the road. It was left to individual citizens, mainly in the North, to lobby and even go to court to try to compel the authorities to fulfil their duties regarding nature and biodiversity. The result has been delay after delay and serious cost overruns.

The cross-Border dimension of the A5 highlights that problems of transport cannot be addressed within one part of this island. Whether it is roads or rail, we will either have all-island solutions or no solutions at all. Both North and South, there is an east-west divide. Belfast sucks investment at the expense of Derry and Fermanagh. Meanwhile, the growth of Dublin deprives Donegal and Sligo of a fair shot at fixing their problems. We need a transport system which leaves no county or region behind. The A5 has to be a key part of this, as does a decent rail service. If one took a map from 1920, one would see an extensive network of rail services that serviced that part of the island but now there is absolute desolation in relation to railway services. We need not to depend on roads and perhaps have an alternative to the car, and that should be rail services.

Bringing the A5 up to standard will not solve all our transport problems but without a safe clean modern A5, it is hard to see how other transport challenges can be met. This is not a question of roads versus rail. It is notable that, generally speaking, the areas across the island with the worst roads are the areas with no rail service at all. One final lesson we can learn from the A5 saga is that the interests of the environment should be from the outset a central factor in the planning of any future infrastructural projects on this island.

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