The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, announced a £14 billion transport project yesterday which he said would lead to a reduction in travel times, modernising of the public transport system and the building of new light rail and underground systems in Dublin.
However, the plan, covering the next 16 years, was attacked by the Fine Gael leader, Mr John Bruton, who said that from a Government in its fourth year in office it was "a confession of failure".
"A good part of today's announcement consists of projects already published in the National Plan and already far behind schedule and way over projected budget. A Government that cannot manage construction projects in budget and on time has little business talking about things that might be happening 16 years from now," Mr Bruton said.
Speaking at the publication of A Platform for Change yesterday, Mr Conor McCarthy, chairman of the Dublin Transportation Office, said there had been an explosion in the demand for transport and we were now facing and exceeding demand which had not been expected for 10 years.
There had been a "dramatic rise" in both peak and off-peak journey times. In Dublin at present there were about 300,000 journeys at morning peak times and about 200,000 at off-peak times. It was expected that these figures would increase by 2016 to 500,000 peak-time journeys and 250,000 off-peak journeys. The target of the plan was to reduce overall travel times to 34 minutes which, without implementation, would stand at 76 minutes.
The other benefits, he said, were that energy consumption would be down by 41 per cent and accidents by over one-third.
Mr Alan Westwell, managing director of Bus Atha Cliath, said that the bus fleet replacement programme was now three years ahead of schedule and a further five new Quality Bus Corridors would be completed in Dublin this year. Existing QBCs were cutting journey times by up to 40 per cent and increasing passenger numbers by up to 150 per cent.
Mr Westwell said that by 2006 there would be a substantial increase in the bus fleet, a package of QBCs would be completed, the Luas would be in operation, there would be greater capacity in the suburban/mainline rail system, the transport system would be integrated and there would be competition in the bus market.
Mr Michael Tobin, chief executive of the National Roads Authority, outlined progress on developing dual carriageways throughout the State, including to Galway, Waterford, Limerick and the Border. After completion, the journey time to Cork would be reduced by almost an hour, with reductions of half-an-hour on other routes.
The Tanaiste, Ms Harney, said that the national transport network would be totally transformed over the next six years. While we had a first-rate economy at present, we had a third-rate infrastructure, and this was not appropriate to the needs of the fastest-growing economy in the developed world.
The Dublin Chamber of Commerce welcomed the plans, saying that they incorporated many of the key projects long identified by it as vitally important for the ongoing economic wellbeing of the region.