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

I will be perfectly honest. I do not think we are going to build a new rail line to Wexford and the south east. It makes much more sense to use a lot of the existing assets and make the most of them. It is not just about the Wexford to Dublin line. We also need to reopen the Rosslare to Waterford line which will improve connectivity between Wexford and Waterford. It will also allow us to further enhance capacity from Waterford up to Dublin as an alternative route. We will not let the Wexford line go. It needs significant investment in terms of protection against coastal erosion. I agree with Deputy Murphy that the current services are not serving the public so we cannot just leave them be but the option of radically and dramatically increasing the frequency would see a very significant increase in patronage. It is not just that though. We are also looking at putting in quality bus corridors on large sections of the N11 to improve the bus services for people coming from Wexford up to Dublin. That is a significant project in its own right. That will be delivered rather than a new high-speed rail line along the N11, which would cost many billions. There are other spending priorities that we also have to fund. We need to use the existing network much more. It is not being used at present and I believe that if we electrify the network as far as Wicklow and have a shuttle service, we could see a dramatic improvement.

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