Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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Question 304: To ask the Minister for Transport the level of funding provided for bus corridors in 2006, particularly for those serving Dublin 15 and the Blanchardstown area; the information available to his Department on the way in which this is spent; the amount and percentage of such funding drawn down in each of the past five years; the information available to his Department on the number of bus lane kilometres in Fingal; the information available to his Department on the different quality bus corridors and the number of pinch points for buses on each route; the percentage of each route where a bus lane exists; if he has satisfied himself with the level of QBC provision in Fingal; the legislative measures he proposes to speed up bus priority measures; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4422/07]

Martin Cullen (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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Some €34m was made available in 2006 for bus corridors in the GDA, of which €21,907,874 was spent.

The table below details the provision of spending to bus schemes within the Dublin 15 area, during 2006.

The DTO Executive reports to the Department, as funds are claimed by agencies, regarding the allocations to bus schemes and the draw-down on these funds.

The amount and percentage of such funding drawn down in each of the past five years is as follows:-

Information on bus lane kilometres relates to bus corridors serving the Fingal area rather than those within particular local authority boundaries, as this determines the effectiveness of the measures in question.

The following bus lanes service the Fingal area:

Finglas QBC (6 KM);

Swords QBC covers (21.6 KM);

Blanchardstown QBC (18.4 KM);

Malahide QBC covers (7.5 KM); and

Ballymun Road scheme (2.7KM).

On the issue of pinch points, the annual monitoring exercise undertaken by the DTO shows where bus priority infrastructure continues to require an improvement in performance in terms of protecting bus operations from the effects of traffic congestion. The results of these monitoring exercises are used by the DTO to inform the development of the bus priority scheme programme. I am informed by the DTO that a significant portion of the Quality Bus Network Office's 2007 programme addresses urgent needs such as pinchpoints. The Deputy may care to examine the 2003, 2004 and 2005 QBC Monitoring reports which are available on the DTO website at http://www. dto.ie/web2006/qbcmon.htm. The 2006 report will be published shortly.

Given the presence of overlaps and discontinuities, the provision of QBCs is recorded in terms of kilometres treated rather than percentages of route. There are approximately 170 kilometres of treated QBCs (as designated in the DTI Final Report) and non QBCs in the GDA. Details are set out in the attached tables. The development and implementation of bus priority measures is a matter for the relevant local authorities. I have no proposals for specific legislative measures in respect of bus priority measures.