Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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221. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the extent to which he has prioritised various projects in the capital plan for road and rail expansion over the next five years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [49630/17]

Shane Ross (Dublin Rathdown, Independent)
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The capital investment programme in the roads sector continues to be framed by the conclusions reached in my Department's Strategic Framework for Investment in Land Transport (SFILT) which highlighted the importance of the maintenance and renewal of transport infrastructure together with targeted investments to improve the existing network.

The bulk of the expenditure in the programme will, therefore, be directed towards road maintenance and renewal and meeting contractual commitments under the road PPP programme.  The additional funding provided as part of the Capital Plan Review will, however, allow for significant enhancements to the programme.  On national roads, the extra funding will facilitate a range of initiatives including M50 safety enhancement works, measures to reduce energy usage for traffic route lighting, the inclusion of some additional major and minor road upgrade schemes in TII’s construction programme and the appraisal of a range of projects with a view to developing a pipeline of future projects.  Financial provision is also being made to meet the Government’s commitment to contribute to the A5 upgrade.

As regards regional and local roads the enhanced programme will allow a significant number of additional road upgrade schemes aimed at addressing safety, employment generation and support and urban regeneration to be advanced.

I have secured funding of over €400 million for investment in public transport in 2018.  This increased funding will allow rollout of a number of key programmes to address congestion and emerging capacity constraints on our public transport system across our cities.  This includes:

- Commencing rollout of the BusConnects programme;

- Planning and design work for new urban cycling and walking routes in our main cities. This will pave the way for an intensive construction programme commencing substantially in 2019;

- Additional Luas capacity, with additional trams and longer trams on the Luas Network;

- Maintaining the heavy rail network to protect investment already made in our national railway system;

- Progressing the City Centre Re-signalling Project to improve speeds on mainline rail and the new rail Central Traffic Control Centre.

- Continuing the programme of retro-fitting older existing public transport facilities to improve their accessibility features;

- Traffic management, bus priority and other smarter travel projects in our cities.

- Piloting of emerging low emission technologies, particularly for buses, and also measures to encourage the transition of the national taxi fleet towards alternative fuels and technologies;

- Planning and design work for new Metro North. 

Budget 2018 provided a four-year capital envelope for public transport of over €2.7 billion to 2021. As I have previously outlined to the Deputy, this includes a multi-annual capital envelope of over €770 million for the BusConnects programme. This significant funding will enable us to put in place the kind of bus system that is needed to cater for Ireland’s future economic growth and growing transport needs, with high quality infrastructure and services, coupled with major improvements in ticketing and information, all providing a modern, faster, reliable, convenient and attractive public transport solution.