The costs associated with the delayed Ennis bypass have risen to €205 million following a two-year delay in the project, it emerged yesterday.
Work on the project was set to start two years ago after the Government confirmed the Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) for the scheme.
However, the tendering process for the road scheme was suspended by the National Roads Authority (NRA) in October 2001, just weeks prior to the anticipated green light for the project, due to a lack of Government funding.
At the time, the estimated cost of the project was €130 million. Now it has emerged that the cost of the scheme has increased to €205 million, almost a 60 per cent rise in the cost of the project.
This emerged yesterday when the Minister for Transport, Mr Brennan, announced in Shannon that work would finally begin on the Ennis project next March.
Mr Brennan described the scheme "as one of the country's most strategically important road projects", stating that the tendering process for the project will be complete in December, with construction on the road starting in March.
He said yesterday: "The existing N18 through Ennis is operating at levels up to three times in excess of its anticipated capacity. This new bypass will bring major road relief to Ennis from the very heavy volumes of traffic."
Mr Brennan said that the new route will remove 14,000 vehicles per day from Ennis's roads, rising to 35,000 vehicles using the bypass per day in 2027.
The Ennis scheme is the largest bypass project planned by the NRA and involves the construction of a 13.8km eastern bypass of Ennis, along with a western relief road of 7.1km.
Explaining the huge rise in costs for the bypass, a spokesman for the NRA said that the initial cost of the Ennis project would have been made in the late 1990s. He said: "Since 1999, road construction costs have increased by around 50 per cent."
