James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Leas-Cheann Comhairle agus leis an Teachta. I thank Deputy Stanton for his kind comments. Indeed, I worked well with him when the shoe was on the other foot, when he was in ministerial office and I was a backbench Deputy. I thank him for the courtesy he extended to me at the time and his helpfulness in dealing with my queries. I hope I can reciprocate.

I had the opportunity to visit County Cork on one of my first ministerial outings on Monday of this week. Granted, I was not in the Deputy's area, but I went to Macroom with Deputy Aindrias Moynihan. I saw Millstreet railway station, the upgraded N22 and the opportunity for active travel on the old N22. There are a lot of opportunities there. I am very excited about the opportunities for active travel and for greener projects such as the one the Deputy has spoken of in his Topical Issue. It is quite an interesting proposal. We have all seen the "rail to trail" idea, whereby an old railway line is stripped out and replaced with a greenway where the land is still reserved and owned by the State. It is popular in the United States and elsewhere. It has been done here. The Deputy's "trail to bus" suggestion almost does things the other way round while making use of land that may be available. It is an interesting proposition.

A number of projects are ongoing in the Cork area, as the Deputy will probably be aware. The Cork metropolitan area transport strategy has been developed to deliver an accessible, integrated transport network, including a bus system, that enables the sustainable growth of Cork up to 2040. Good progress has been made in delivering on that strategy, including the BusConnects Cork programme, which will be transformative for Cork, as BusConnects generally will be for all cities. The designers of that programme, Jarrett Walker and Associates, carried out a review of bus services in the Cork metropolitan area in conjunction with the National Transport Authority, Cork City Council, Cork County Council and Bus Éireann and developed a new network of bus services for the Cork metropolitan area. Following an extensive public consultation process, the new BusConnects network was finalised and published in June 2022. This includes the proposed 31X bus route between Youghal and Cork city centre, which will pass through Midleton. This route will provide a relevant road-based route for the Cork-Youghal, as opposed to the greenway, which is naturally focused on walking and cycling. The Deputy's proposal is to run a bus along the greenway and I would like to drill into it a little more. Instinctively, it appears that it may conflict with pedestrians and cyclists. The 31X will provide a road-based route which would not have that conflict. I am open to the Deputy’s thoughts on that and look forward to hearing them.

Under Connecting Ireland, there is a proposed regional bus corridor route from Cork to Waterford via Youghal, with more frequent services on this corridor and better integration of existing services. It is proposed that this will commence in the coming years. The 31X and other important regional routes will be rolled out in that corridor and will make an impact on the area. The draft network under BusConnects Cork aims to provide an increase of over 50% in bus services across the city. This will provide a better overall network to allow more people to access more places more efficiently, which is at the heart of public transport. These redesigned services will be rolled out in the coming years. Another key component of BusConnects Cork is bus priority measures to tackle the issue of traffic congestion and improve punctuality and reliability. The NTA has conducted a series of public consultations on the new sustainable transport corridors for Cork, including bus routes. A third round of public consultation on the preferred route options for 11 corridors concluded in December. There was a positive response to those proposals and the preparation of a business case is ongoing. Again, that is a further roll-out of additional bus services and corridors in the area.

Additionally, the all-island strategic rail review will inform the development of the railway sector on the island of Ireland over the coming decades. The draft review, which was published for strategic environmental assessment in July of last year, considered a proposal to develop a new railway line between Midleton and Waterford, which would serve Youghal. This did not make the final cut when the recommendations went for implementation. The final review, taking account of the issues raised in the public consultation, will be submitted to the Government shortly and published by the end of the summer.

The development of high-quality cycle infrastructure is a priority for the Department. Greenways enable greater connectivity between local communities. The development of an inter-urban cycling corridor between Waterford and Cork is a key priority project in that programme. I thank the Deputy for raising this Topical Issue and look forward to hearing his response to what I have said.

See this speech in context