The National Roads Authority has approved plans drawn up by Offaly County Council for a long-awaited bypass around Tullamore.
The news has come as a relief to council officials who became embroiled in controversy last year after it emerged that their "preferred" path for the €44 million bypass cut through part of an area designated as a candidate special area of conservation.
Council officials had to go back to the drawing board after objections were lodged by Dúchas, among others, to the bypass being routed through the candidate area in Charleville wood. The area had been so designated because of the presence of the vertigo moulinsiana, a rare species of snail.
After fresh plans were drawn up a so-called compromise route emerged, containing some elements of the "preferred" route but skirting the candidate special area of conservation. This route was agreed last October by the county council, despite objections from residents of Mucklagh outside Tullamore who claimed it would split their village in two.
It is this compromise route which has now been given the authority's stamp of approval. It was not among any of the original six routes put out to public consultation by the council.
The local authority will now engage a consultant engineer to prepare an environmental impact statement. It will also conduct soil investigations which may result in the route being "tweaked" slightly, a spokesman for the local authority said.
After more detailed design work is completed on the 15 km bypass, moves will be made to acquire land required for the road by compulsory purchase order. This process is likely to take up to 12 months. Following that, the building work will be put out to tender and the bypass itself may not be completed for a number of years. The completion date may well depend on how much funding is allocated for the work every year by the roads authority.
It is understood the council believes it could have moved more swiftly on the project this year had it received a greater allocation of funding from the National Roads Authority. Council sources said the budget it received for work on the bypass in 2002 was only a quarter of the €1 million it expected.
The county manager, Mr Niall Sweeney, has given assurances that the council's doors will be open to deal "fairly and squarely" with those adversely affected.