The Byzantine traffic system in Cork is about to become even more of a mystery to locals and tourists alike, when the city's main thoroughfare - Patrick Street - is dug up next Thursday to facilitate the laying of new sewer pipes.
This will mark phase one of a £120 million main drainage scheme which is being 80 per cent funded by the EU's cohesion fund. The Irish taxpayer will fund the remainder of the bill.
There will be major traffic restrictions on Patrick Street, with one side of the two-way system being reduced to a single lane when the excavators move in on Thursday.
They will initially burrow under the road surface between Merchant's Quay and Maylor Street before moving along the rest of the street towards Daunt's Square.
It will be next autumn before Patrick Street is restored to full use. In the meantime, Corkonians can expect inconvenience, delays, more gridlock and no doubt, road rage.
When Patrick Street is finished, the local authority will move on to Oliver Plunkett Street, the South Mall and Washington Street, as well as some more minor streets.
The people of Cork can expect disruption until the end of 2002.
When the project has been completed, human sewage will no longer be pumped directly into the two channels of the River Lee. It will be pumped to a modern treatment station in the harbour area, where it will be treated to a very high standard.
Fertiliser pellets will be produced before the remaining clear water is pumped out to sea with no damage to the harbour's ecosystem, according to Cork Corporation.
The local authority has taken steps to manage traffic in the most user friendly way it can devise.
The £95 million Lee tunnel will open on May 21st next and that is expected to divert much of the heavy traffic at present using the city centre away from it.
"There is going to be some disruption; but in the end we will have a cleaner city," a spokesman for the corporation said yesterday.
Mr James O'Sullivan, a spokesman for the Cork Business Association, said last night that his organisation had been in close contact with Cork Corporation concerning the project and had established a special committee to review its implications.