Total spending on non-national roads this year will be around £348 million - £264 million in Government grants to local authorities, and another £84 million from council resources.
The grants were announced in Kilkenny yesterday by the Minister for the Environment, Mr Dempsey, who said they represented an 11 per cent increase on last year's initial allocations.
The money is part of the £1.6 billion total to be spent on these roads as part of the National Development Plan between now and 2006.
The bulk of the funding for this year's programme is to come from the Local Government Fund, financed by car tax receipts. There will be some exchequer funding, plus the local authorities' £84 million, but the level of EU co-funding will be small.
The aim of the non-national road building programme is to "restore the entire network of regional and local roads in county council areas by 2005"; this reflects the fact that the non-national roads are some of the most neglected in the State.
The main features of this year's non-national roads grants are:
£384 million in total for restoration works this year
£147 million for the restoration of regional and local roads, including £114 million for new works and £33 million for maintenance. It is hoped this is sufficient to make inroads on some schemes which were originally planned for 2001.
£8.7 million for Dublin traffic management.
£5 million towards the Dundrum, Co Dublin, bypass, Ballymun Main Street redevelopment and the M4 interchange at Celbridge, Co Kildare.
£31.5 million in grants to urban authorities, an increase of almost 44 per cent on 1999.
Grants of more than £49 million under the Specific Improvement Grants Scheme, which replaces the previously EU Co-Financed Scheme. This represents an increase of 10 per cent on last year's allocation for the EU Co-Financed Scheme.
The allocations to each local authority were notified to the authorities yesterday.
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