Northerners look on the Republic’s motorways with envy – but tolls are a bridge too far

Why does Northern Ireland refuse to learn from the Republic’s success with toll roads? The question has arisen again with the announcement of the Cork to Limerick motorway.

As usual, it will be met with studied silence. There shall be no interference with the God-given right of every Ulsterman and Ulsterwoman to drive freely down the king’s highway, or across land stolen by the crown, depending upon one’s perspective.

Northern Ireland should be uniquely interested in tolling because Stormont has full responsibility for the roads, yet all fuel and vehicle taxes go to Westminster. This is a freakishly unusual disconnection between income and obligation. In most countries, responsibility for roads is split between local, regional and national government, with revenue-raising powers to match.

Innovative policies are often considered unrealistic at Stormont due to the years it can take to create relevant statutory powers, but that excuse does not apply. Legislation was enacted under direct rule in the mid-1990s for toll roads, private operators and everything else required to copy the Republic, or adopt almost any other tolling model. This has been sitting on the statute books ever since, ready for a Stormont infrastructure minister to deploy. It has never been used.

Northerners look on the Republic’s motorways with envy – but tolls are a bridge too far

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A teachable moment was missed after the 2006 St Andrews Agreement, when the Irish government pledged £400 million towards the £800 million cost of the A5 cross-Border dual-carriageway. A tolling option could have been proposed; people in Northern Ireland were already familiar with the Republic’s new motorways and impressed by them.

While projected traffic levels would not cover the A5′s costs, tolls could have made a contribution and, perhaps more importantly, normalised the concept. But Dublin preferred to promise Stormont a cheque, an offer withdrawn after the financial crash and recently renewed. The project’s cost has since doubled, although money is not ultimately considered the hold-up with the A5. It has been delayed by planning objections from landowners and environmentalists.

The most obvious case for a toll road has become the York Street Interchange, where three motorways meet in a tangle of signalised junctions on the edge of Belfast city centre. Upgrading it to a free-flowing junction would be Northern Ireland’s equivalent of the M50 bridge. Brexit and collapses of devolution have caused financial support from Brussels and London to fall through, rendering the scheme implausible under Stormont’s budget. Other upgrades that might be suitable for tolling include routes from Belfast to Derry, Newry and Enniskillen.

There is a perception road tolling is impractical in Northern Ireland as any stretches of new motorway would be short and any longer routes would be dual-carriageways, where tolls could be easy to avoid.

The distance-based tolling system planned between Cork and Limerick shows these issues are straightforward to address.

Private finance for public-private partnerships should not be difficult to secure. External investment in Northern Ireland is often pictured as cutting the ribbon on factories but infrastructure is typically a more attractive proposition. Pension and other investment funds in the UK and abroad have complained of a dearth of opportunities in Northern Ireland. They have been keen to lend for social housing construction, one of the few such opportunities available.

Stormont has been stung before by building schools and hospitals through public-private partnerships. However, that was the fault of expensive Westminster-designed models. No major party objects to the idea in principle, or to toll roads in particular.

Nationalists have controlled the Department for Infrastructure throughout the past eight years of on-off devolution. Sinn Féin is currently in charge and should remain so for at least another three years. In 2016, responding to a Belfast Telegraph article, Sinn Féin infrastructure minister Chris Hazzard said he was willing to consider funding new roads through tolls. Hazzard is on the left of his party, a fan of Venezuelan socialism. If he can approve of toll roads, anyone can.

In an Irish News article last month, former SDLP adviser Brendan Mulgrew asked why road tolling is not on Stormont’s agenda, given its financial constraints.

“Do you think twice when you throw €2.90 into the basket when heading down the tolled M1 towards Dublin?” he wrote. “Why could we do not that on this side of the Border? Why can we not even contemplate the possibility?”

Mulgrew runs a public relations firm with other SDLP-linked figures who have been involved in infrastructure and economic policy.

Still, these are faint signals from nationalism when it usually trumpets the Republic’s achievements. Unionists are equally muted. Having long taken pride in Northern Ireland’s superior roads, they are well aware the tables have turned. They should be advocating the South’s example as a way to catch up, even if the suggestion would be initially unpopular. As so often at Stormont, everybody knows what should be done but nobody will step forward to do it.