Noel McCarthy (Cork East, Fine Gael)
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164. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport when he expects the remaining local road speed limit reductions to come into effect nationally; if it is envisaged that urban routes will see these proposed reductions before those on national secondary roads; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4673/25]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal East, Fianna Fail)
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The Government’s Road Safety Strategy 2021-2030 seeks to improve road safety in Ireland and make our roads safer for all road users. The Strategy focuses on achieving Vision Zero, zero road deaths or serious injuries by 2050. The introduction of more consistent and appropriate speed limits will help to improve road safety in Ireland. These changes are being made under the Road Traffic Act 2024. The Act facilitates the enactment of a number of key recommendations proposed from the Speed Limit Review, which was undertaken by my Department and key stakeholders in 2023.

The first phase of these speed limit changes came into effect on Friday 7 February 2025, when default speed limit on rural local roads decreased from 80km/hr to 60km/hr. Based on the principal recommendations from the 2023 review, future phases will focus on default speed limit reductions from 50km/hr to 30km/hr in urban cores and from 100km/hr to 80km/hr on national secondary roads. As with the changes to default speed limits on local roads, Local Authorities will have the devolved power to vary limits from the defaults in their local areas where this is appropriate.

The timeline for the implementation of subsequent phases of the default speed limit changes will be informed by the rollout of the local, rural road speed limit change.