Engineers today warned that Government delays in road planning and design could mean vital building would be held up by a decade with disastrous consequences.
The Association of Consulting Engineers of Ireland (ACEI) today called on the Government to provide funding immediately for the continued planning and construction of key roads around the country, including bypasses around Sligo, Ennis, Cashel, Monaghan, Carrickmacross and Castleblaney.
The ACEI said these roads, as well as a number of other routes, are all promised under the National Development Plan (NDP). However, planning work has recently been slowed or stopped in these projects.
An ACEI spokesman, Mr Kerry O'Sullivan, said today the Government should borrow to complete NDP projects. "Nobody would criticise a Government for capital borrowing to make a wise, strategic investment in the country's infrastructure that would reap major benefits for the economy," he said.
The Minister for Transport, Mr Seamus Brennan, promised at the weekend more money would be made available for road building in next month's Budget. But he said tolls may have to be introduced to pay for certain projects.
Mr O'Sullivan said the Government could contract private companies to collect tolls to repay the capital costs. "This method of funding is increasingly being used in France and throughout Europe to fund key infrastructural projects".
Mr O'Sullivan warned that when construction industry goes into decline, there is a "ripple effect" across the economy. "Dole queues will increase and the social effects of unemployment will resurface," he said. "It would take years to crank up again to where we are now".
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