The idea of running the Luas line across the Red Cow roundabout, one of the busiest main routes into Dublin, was "incredible", the Tánaiste, Ms Harney, said yesterday.
The Red Cow roundabout was in her own constituency, Ms Harney pointed out. The Luas was "a dreadful indictment of our processes", she said.
Future infrastructure projects of this scale had to have the relevant overall expertise, even if that meant bringing in foreign expertise from the beginning, she said.
Ms Harney was speaking in Killarney where she addressed the Beverage Council of Ireland.
She said the Critical Infrastructure Bill would speed up the processes and mean greater input from the private sector. The €6 billion put aside for roads under the National Development Plan would deliver many fewer now.
Infrastructure had to be developed. It should not take so long to travel between places in such a small country, she said.
Navan for years had been known as a place an hour or less from Dublin. Now the same journey took two hours.
"It's not about money, it's about getting value for money," Ms Harney said.
She also called for greater flexibility under the EU Growth and Stability Pact in order to borrow for schools, public transport and broadband.
If the straitjackets the Government had to work under now had been applied 20 years ago, there would never have been a Celtic Tiger or its sequel, she said.
Mr Brian Geoghegan, director of economic affairs at the employers' group IBEC, who spoke on "The Celtic Tiger, alive and well, hibernating, or just holding its tail?" said the tiger had certainly slowed to a walking pace.
"But there are a lot of things that can still go right," he said.
Fiscal policy in the budget had to focus on keeping inflation down to 2 per cent, he stressed.