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

I thank the Acting Chair. He is right, I am very privileged and pleased to be here. I will use my time to reflect on some evolving developments and I look forward to hearing the Senators' perspectives afterwards.

There are many different aspects to this subject. We have our national development plan.We are rolling out the national planning framework. We are at the cusp, subject to getting an Administration back in Northern Ireland, of a strategic all-island rail review. This may be very useful in this very wide context. Our debate is about the bigger picture in the sense of the rail network and where it is going.

I will give two or three perspectives that are quite broad and inform thinking in government and the investment decisions we need to make. We cannot ignore the climate imperative which is dominating everything in transport. It is an incredible challenge. We must halve our emissions in eight years and they grew 5% last year. It is seemingly impossible but we will do it by reducing demand for transport, shifting to public transport and improving technology through the use of electricity and other measures. It has to be moved towards a better system so it will be possible. This modal shift will drive us towards rail investment. A range of projects are already in train, if Senators will excuse the pun. These include the DART+ programme in Dublin, the metropolitan rail network in Dublin and major developments in metropolitan rail in Cork, Galway, Waterford and Limerick.

We should refer to the national planning framework that states we may need more balanced regional development, compact development and low-carbon development. Rail investment gives us all three, particularly rail investment in some of the cities outside Dublin to get balanced regional development. Next week we will go down to Waterford to turn the sod on a major development to move the train station down the Suir to the North Quays and put in place a new sustainability bridge. This will transform Waterford for the better.

Our priority investment in the European recovery and resilience fund was investment in the metropolitan rail system in Cork. The numbers there are taking off even before we increase the frequency. We have just put out a tender contract for the Glounthaune to Midleton twin-tracking upgrade. This will allow us to get from a frequency of approximately every 30 minutes to every ten minutes. We are doing works at Kent Station. We will start to have a Cork metropolitan service from Midleton or Cobh to Mallow. I am very keen that we use our new battery electric trains in this. It will start to create a world-class metropolitan rail system for Cork that will transform the city and create great opportunities to develop housing in areas such as Tivoli, Monard, Blarney and all of the stations that we will open.

It is the same in Limerick. We are steaming ahead, if Senators will excuse another pun, on the reopening of the line to Shannon Foynes Port. We have committed in a pathfinder project to investing in a station in Moyross. We can deliver this in the next three years. This is not on the never-never. There are hundreds of acres of State land around Moyross, where the community needs better connectivity. This could be transformative.

It is the same in Galway. We are working around Ceannt Station and Oranmore station and looking at the upgrade of Athenry to Galway section. It would give us real enhanced capability and capacity for metropolitan rail in Galway. Our first priority should be development in the regions. I am not anti-Dublin - far from it - but Dublin will not cope if all of the development is on the east coast, which is what is happening at present. In fairness it is not all of it, but half the development taking place in the country is there.

I want to look at two other strategic developments without pre-empting the rail review or the decisions that have to be made on a joint basis North and South. This is looking at the long term. It started by looking at a high-speed Cork to Belfast service but broadened out and began to look at the north west. One of the very interesting prospects is a potential new rail line. We have been discussing this in the Dáil. It might spur from Portadown to Dungannon, Omagh, Strabane and Derry with a connection to Letterkenny. This blue-sky thinking, going back to where we were in the early part of the 20th century, could be transformative for the rail network for the entire island and particularly for Donegal which does not have the connectivity and public transport service it needs. It is one of the projects I will be looking to see if we can promote and work with our colleagues in the North to make sure it is in the rail review. It would give us the potential to be transformative in our approach. It is a big long-term project.

The other broad strategic project I will spend time discussing because it is important is to consider whether we are using the existing lines we have to their full potential. Lord knows we have closed enough lines over the past 50 to 60 years. We would really question whether we should keep cutting those that remain or whether we turn it around. The Department's investment strategy is based on trying to use existing assets rather than always building new ones to enhance existing services. It is better in carbon terms and cost terms. It is critically important and good policy.

I keep coming back to a particular example because it is an obvious one. This is the existing line from Waterford to Limerick, Ennis and onwards, particularly the Waterford to Limerick section. It is completely underutilised. The services are so infrequent and the journeys so slow that it is quicker by car. In effect, it is not used. There is only a small number of freight trains running south from Ballina. The infrastructure is not being used. If we were to build it new it would probably cost between €10 billion and €20 billion. It is very expensive to build new rail lines. The strategic question we have is whether we close the line in the same way as we have closed so many lines in the past 50 to 60 years. To my mind, the answer is surely "No". If we are going to keep it, we must ask how we will use it. This draws us into the slightly bigger picture and bigger thinking on what we might do.

There has been a lot of discussion about the western rail corridor in the past five to ten years. There have been surveys and I believe EY did a study last year. Some very good historical analysis was presented recently. The questions that have been asked about that line have been too narrow in their focus. These are questions such as whether enough people from Tuam or Claremorris would be going to Galway to justify building a section from Athenry to Claremorris. Understandably the answer came back that there would not because it would be faster to get the bus directly into Galway and the numbers would not be that large. We should think of it differently, in the context of a longer western rail corridor that runs from Westport or Ballina through Claremorris, Athenry, Ennis, Limerick, Tipperary town, Bansha, Cahir, Carrick-on-Suir, Waterford and Wexford. Then we would have a very different question. I would call this the western Atlantic rail corridor. We should look at it in a big State perspective. What would that line have? It would have a lot of our industries, including all of our biomedical industries in Galway and up the west coast, and all of the big foreign direct investment plants in Mayo. There is a big industrial quarter in the Limerick and mid-west region. At present reaching these involves driving through Tipperary town, Cahir, Clonmel, Carrick-on-Suir, Waterford and on to Rosslare and France. If we told these industries we would provide them with an alternative that is lower carbon, reliable and does not involve trucks but instead uses the rail line, and we also told them they could choose to go out via Shannon Foynes, Marino Point in Cork, Waterford or Rosslare Port, this big strategic thinking would have a market.

It is very hard to switch to rail freight. All of the experts say that if it is not 300 km, it will not work. However, they are not thinking about climate or congestion or how to get all of the drivers for all of the trucks. We have an existing asset which is being underutilised. The new sections between Rosslare and Waterford would have a relatively very low cost because the line is pretty much still intact. The section from Athenry to Claremorris would be slightly trickier because it would have to cross the N17. This development would have a relatively low cost given that there is route alignment. It would give the State a strategic option for the west, north west, mid-west, south and east and connect them together. We would have to do the same with Dublin Port. We would have inland freight connecting yards to marshal the container and other traffic.That is a strategic bet we should be willing to make. It is an investment decision I hope to see contained in the strategic rail review, and we could do it reasonably quickly because we are using existing infrastructure and assets. We as a country were brilliant at rail. If we go for it and think strategically in that way, we would see rail freight coming back, as well as passenger services. The advantage of rail freight is it re-opens lines, improves infrastructure and then one can build the passenger services on the back of it. That is one of the most interesting prospects for us. I am keen to hear Senators' views. As part of the strategic rail review it is one of the projects I would like to see us take on. We are going to have to discuss and consider it in the coming weeks. I hope Stormont is restored soon. As soon as it is, this issue will be on the table.