Given its troubled history, it is not surprising that, no sooner than when the last section of the M50 motorway opens, upgrading works are due to begin.
Pending the High Court challenge regarding work at Carrickmines Castle, the final section, the South Eastern Motorway between Ballinteer and Shankill, is due to open in May, nearly 10 years past its original completion date. Upgrading work is due to begin soon after that.
First proposed nearly 35 years ago, the M50 spent nearly 20 years on the planning board before work got under way on the by-pass for the Dublin area.
The seeds for future problems were set in the planning stages. In the late 1980s, against the advice of professionals, the Government decided on the cheaper option of basic junctions and two lanes, believing that the traffic volumes on the road would never be that high, and that the additional cost of €65 million was too great.
It was also decided to build the motorway in sections, again for finance reasons.
The first of these linked Blanchardstown and the N3 to the N4 and Tallaght via the West-Link Toll Bridge. This section opened in 1990, and it was a further six years before Blanchardstown was linked to the M1. The penultimate stretch, the Southern Cross between Tallaght and Ballinteer, was beset by legal challenges, and did not open until 2001.
By then the modest junctions of the existing road, such as the Red Cow Inn, had become some of the worst traffic bottlenecks in the country, and that an upgrade was badly needed. This will cost 10 times the €65 million the Government wanted to save by going with the cheaper motorway plan.