A recurring criticism of the way this State conducts its affairs relates to the inordinate length of time and money it takes to complete major infrastructure projects. The decades-long saga of the Dublin airport rail link, the labyrinthine tale of the National Children’s Hospital, even the unnecessary decade it took to connect the capital’s two Luas lines – all speak to a culture of political vacillation, bureaucratic inertia and public litigiousness.
Against this backdrop, it would be easy to undervalue the modest achievements that are currently making a positive contribution to the quality of people’s lives, particularly in Dublin, such as the official opening this week of Kishoge train station, serving the new suburb of Clonburris.
The station lay unused for 15 years, a victim of the 2008 financial and construction crashes. But now, refurbished at a cost of ¤3.8 million, it will be served by 48 trains each way daily, with a journey time of 14 minutes to Heuston. The planned Dart+ scheme will bring electrification and faster journey times in the years ahead.
Meanwhile, BusConnects, the ambitious reconfiguration of Dublin’s bus network, is beginning to have an impact on the city, with passenger numbers rising by 26 per cent on the routes that have already been rolled out. The project includes the construction by 2030 of hundreds of kilometres of segregated bus and cycle lanes, redressing the current imbalance between private motorists and other road users. Such large projects will inevitably cause disruption and inconvenience. But when complete they will lead to clear improvements in the public realm as well as playing a part in reducing carbon emissions.
A less heralded but still important project in Dublin city centre is extending continuous footpaths across smaller street junctions to improve the quality of life for pedestrians and emphasise to drivers that they should exercise caution and give way to those on foot.
Alongside all this, the brouhaha over a handful of relatively minor adjustments to traffic flows on the Liffey quays seems overblown. It remains to be seen whether these will achieve their objective of reducing the number of private cars transiting the city core en route to other destinations. But if they reduce the congestion which currently afflicts public transport, that will be worthwhile.
Taoiseach Simon Harris has suggested that funds the State has received from the sale of shares in AIB should be directed toward investment in infrastructure. With population growth on a seemingly inexorable upward curve, it is indisputable that infrastructure targets need to be revised. That will require the additional investment the Taoiseach proposes. But what is just as essential is a radically improved approach to how public projects of every size are agreed and delivered across the country.