Ulick Burke (Galway East, Fine Gael)
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Question 67: To ask the Minister for Transport and the Marine his plans in relation to increasing the number of park and ride facilities available to commuters. [18126/07]

Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)
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There is funding available under Transport 21 for the development of park and ride facilities by Iarnród Éireann, the RPA and local authorities, and my Department has been encouraging applications in that regard. My Department has approved €10.92 million in funding in 2007 for Iarnród Éireann for park and ride facilities. This funding will provide over 1,600 extra spaces at various locations throughout the network and studies by Irish Rail for a further car park expansion programme. In addition, car park provision will form part of major new railway infrastructure works such as the Kildare Route Project and the Navan Rail Link.

Additional Park and Ride sites will be developed in association with the proposed Luas and Metro lines in Transport 21. These will open at the same time as the lines open for passenger services. These sites are determined by the Railway Procurement Agency (RPA) when individual Railway Order applications are submitted for the various lines. As regards local authorities, my Department has been encouraging them to come forward with proposals, and is prepared to consider capital funding, in specific instances, towards the cost of site acquisition, where the business case justifies it.

In the Greater Dublin Area (GDA), my predecessor approved a DTO strategy for rail-based park and ride on the existing and proposed commuter network in the GDA. A further DTO study indicated that bus-based park and ride would offer limited potential in a city on the scale of Dublin, but that it might be useful in some specific local contexts. Cork, Galway, Limerick and Waterford also have transport plans which include provision for park and ride.

There is already a successful park and ride facility at Black Ash in Cork, and the City and County Councils are currently considering a number of other sites for proposals. In the case of the other provincial cities, the development of park and ride facilities is linked to the development of QBCs, and my Department continues to press these authorities to advance their plans. Funding for such measures is available under Transport 21.