Construction of a high-grade rail line between Cork, Dublin and Belfast is one of the projects which will be grant aided in a €62 billion drive to upgrade transport infrastructure across the EU, the European Commission announced yesterday.

Improved sea links - "motorways of the sea" in Commission parlance - between the Republic and key ports in Spain and Portugal, Scandinavia and the Low Countries are also earmarked in the plan.

They are among 56 projects which the Commission wants to see advanced between now and 2010. Financing for the schemes would be 60 per cent from public funds and 40 per cent from private sources.

The Department of Transport said it is examining the Commission's proposals but that it is too early to comment.

The Commission's initiative is aimed at mobilising investment in plans that will create jobs and boost the economy, said Commission President Mr Romano Prodi.

He said: "We will start immediately with these projects, some of which have been in the works since almost before the birth of Christ." "It is a catalyst which the European Union urgently needs to restart growth," he added.

EU diplomats have expressed scepticism, noting that lists of investment plans had been approved in the past but only a fraction were ever completed.

EU leaders had charged the Commission to draft the priority list at a summit in October.