Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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115. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the status of the work carried out to date in respect of reducing speed limits within and surrounding residential housing estates (details supplied); the amount of funding in respect of 30km per hour speed limits his Department has provided since 2015 to date in 2021; and the breakdown of housing estates in County Kildare that have erected funded signage in their locality. [27771/21]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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The improvement and maintenance of regional and local roads is the statutory responsibility of each local authority, in accordance with the provisions of Section 13 of the Roads Act 1993. Works on those roads are funded from local authorities' own resources supplemented by State road grants, where applicable. In the case of the Dublin local authorities, these authorities largely self-finance their regional and local road maintenance and renewal grant programmes, 30 km/h and slow zone signs have been provided in 7,321 housing estates between 2015 and 2020 in local authority areas funded under my Department's the Regional and Local Road Grant Programme at a cost of €5,623,840. Funding of €817,125 has been allocated by the Department for the installation of 30 km/h and slow zone signage in 2021.

With respect to Kildare County Council, funding of €26,604 was paid to the local authority over the period 2015 to 2020 regarding the installation of speed limit signage and €344,025 has been allocated to the Council this year. My Department does not have details of the individual housing estates in County Kildare where signage has been erected or is being installed this year but this information should be available from the Council.

Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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116. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport his plans to review further the impact that lower speed limits can have as part of a national roads policy in the context of carbon emissions and climate targets. [27772/21]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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The Programme for Government contains a commitment to review and reduce speed limits, where appropriate, to address both road safety issues and carbon emissions, and ensure greater compliance.

The science is unequivocal; we must urgently deliver ambitious and effective emission reduction measures to achieve the objectives of the Paris Agreement and ultimately stabilise global temperatures. In Ireland, we are embedding our commitment to tackling climate change into our national legislation. When adopted, the Climate Action Bill 2021 will mandate carbon budgets for the Irish economy as a whole and will set binding sectoral carbon ceilings—thus ensuring continual long-term planning towards the realisation of Ireland’s 2050 net-zero emission vision. The Climate Action Bill will also legislate for annual Climate Action Plans and Long-Term Climate Action Strategies. These plans will set out a credible pathway to achieving on our Programme for Government commitment to an average 7% per annum reduction in emissions from 2021 to 2030, and to delivering a zero-carbon society by 2050.

Development of Climate Action Plan 2021 is currently underway and at circa 20% of national emissions there can be no doubt that the transport sector must significantly contribute to the national decarbonisation objective and half its emissions by 2030 in line with Programme for Government commitments. We need to take emissions out the movement of people and goods, while still recognising that our transport systems are pivotal in the development of sustainable communities and cities. To achieve this, all potential mitigation measures, including the role of speed limits, are under review. It is expected that Climate Action Plan 2021 will be published later this summer with a detailed breakdown of planned transport mitigation measures and corresponding actions. Thereafter, to ensure transparency and accountability all sectors will report on their climate action progress quarterly.