Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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280. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the budget for greenways for 2022; the number of projects and total number of kilometres that will be funded in 2022; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2319/22]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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As Minister for Transport, I have responsibility for overall policy and exchequer funding in relation to Greenways. Once funding arrangements have been put in place with Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII), and in line with Section 32(2) of the Road Act 1993, the planning, design, and construction of individual Greenways is a matter for TII, in conjunction with the local authorities concerned.

The exchequer capital funding available for Greenways and Active Travel from the Department of Transport in 2022 is €360m.  Within this total €60m is available for Greenways and €290m for Active Travel, with the remaining funds for cross-border Greenway projects, Smarter Travel, etc.

TII has confirmed grant allocations to local authorities of €56.7m for the development of regional and national greenway projects cumulatively totalling 900km approximately.  Details of the 2022 Greenways allocations have been published on my Department's website 93b047d2-77b7-4fed-a4cd-4160e749de7b.pdf (www.gov.ie)

Focusing on 2022 allocations, the €60m for Greenways includes the following.

Greenway Projects - €57m

As expected, the vast bulk of the funding, €57m, is for the roll-out of Greenway infrastructure. The Greenway projects to be funded are shown in Appendix 1 below, showing the status of each project. As can been seen, eight projects (including two divided into phases) will be under construction next year, some of which will be completed. There are many more Greenway projects further back in the project lifecycle. Overall, next year circa 40 projects will be progressed (some further divided into phases). Approximately 900km of Greenways will be in pre- construction and 150km will be constructed in 2022; this compares to circa 850km and 125km respectively for 2021.

NCN - €0.4m

The development of a National Cycle Network (NCN) will be allocated circa €0.4m for 2022. The NCN should provide for a coherent and integrated national cycle network, combining Active Travel and Greenways, to guide both cycling users and future investment. The NCN is being developed by TII, in conjunction with the NTA and other stakeholders, under Departmental oversight. It is under development with a view to issuing a draft for public consultation in the Spring.

Research - €0.13m

Funding is to be allocated to TII for research which will assist with the monitoring and evaluation of the Greenway network, for example user and surveys and “Value for Money” analyses.

Greenway Interpretation, Failte Ireland - €0.75m

It is estimated that a budget of up to €750K will allow for the development of a comprehensive suite of content (drones, video, stills etc) by Fáilte Ireland specific to each of the Greenways already established and also for those coming on stream in 2022. This content will be available for use in a variety of marketing and promotional channels.