The Government has identified four new "gateways" for the development outside of the capital, in its long-awaited National Spatial Strategy (NSS) launched this morning.
The new centres are the towns of Sligo, Letterkenny, Dundalk and the link gateway of Athlone, Tullamore and Mullingar in the midlands. They are now earmarked for development along with the cities of Dublin, Waterford, Cork, Limerick and Galway.
In addition a further network of nine "hubs" have also been identified whose role will be to "energise" the immediate areas around them by providing new structures for more focused investment around the country. These are: Ballina/Castlebar, Tuam, Ennis, Tralee/Killarney, Mallow, Kilkenny, Wexford, Monaghan and Cavan.
The National Spatial Strategy is a blueprint for economic and social development in the State over the next 20 years.
The principal objective of the plan is to ensure that a minimum of 50 per cent of new green-field jobs created will be located outside of the Dublin and the Eastern region over the next 20 years.
It also aims to develop regions other than the Greater Dublin Area in an effort to ensure that any economic and social benefits accrued over the course of the next 20 years are also shared by towns and rural areas across the entire country.
According to the Taoiseach Mr Ahern all other infrastructural development and all other Government policies will be consistent with the Strategy whether it is transport, health, education or housing.
"The NSS is a 20 year strategy designed to enable every place in the country to reap the potential no matter what its size or location", Mr Ahern said.
"It recognises that various regions of the country have different roles.
"It is about making regions competitive according to their strengths and not against one another."
The Minister for the Environment, Mr Martin Cullen, said the plan with consolidate the development as the economic engine of the country, pushing the development of the identified 'gateways' and 'hubs' which, he said, would ensure those towns would reach sufficient scale and critical mass to attract significant investment and job opportunities.
"The NSS is not an investment plan in itself - it is a framework within each existing and future development plans must work," Mr Cullen said.
" . . .The 'gateways' will be expected to drive development across the urban rural areas they influence and support more balanced patterns of national development."
Both the Taoiseach and Mr Cullen insisted, however, that this would not result in the creation of 'mini-Dublins' across the country.