Metro North and Interconnector being built at the same time - Funding?

spacetweek

I'm worried about how the gov is going to be able to afford to fund Metro North and the Interconnector if they're put under construction at the same time.

The presumed timetable for their construction is as follows:
MN: 2009-2013
IC: 2011-2015

Since each project is costing 3 or 4+ billion, that's approx a billion a year each.

However, there's an overlap of 3 years there, 2011-2013. Which means that during the overlap period, two billion will be needed each of those years just for those two projects alone - and it's proposed to have a whole host of other luas lines etc on the go during that time aswell.

How's this gonna work? The yearly public transport allocation right now is nothing like that! This is going to require a major reduction in the road allocation.

Sponge Bob

spacetweek wrote: »

This is going to require a major reduction in the road allocation.

That is in train ( pardon the pun) as I explained here . The Department of Finance bought a new calculator and started robbing the road budget as and from this spring ...even they ones announced in January .

In order to finance the myriad Dublin projects including Metros and Interconnects and Luas bits and Eastern Bypasses and Outer bypasses the Dept of Finance has pulled the Atlantic Road corridor for starters.

Very few NRA projects will be started after this year and the NRA budget will be systematically run down to a measly allocation from 2011 onwards.

Victor

Metro North is a PPP - the government / RPA will only be covering their own costs until services begin and then they are expected to make payments over 30 years.

More realisticly, Dublin will be using a lot of tunnelling resources at that time and that may lead to higher costs.

OTK

spacetweek wrote: »

How's this gonna work? The yearly public transport allocation right now is nothing like that! This is going to require a major reduction in the road allocation.

Metro North is to be funded by PPP over 30 years (an off-balance sheet loan). If the 5bn estimate is right then it will cost 167m/year for 30 years. Or around what the NRA spends in a month.

I don't know how the interconnector is meant to be funded but the dept has said in the past that it's suitable for PPP. http://www.transport.ie/upload/general/2584-0.pdf

invincibleirish

I cant wait for the situation in 2013 when the transfer budget will be entirely spent on the Interconnector & Metro North, leaving nothing for other road and rail projects. Once some politician realises that nothing is being spent on transport outside of Dublin then he is gonna kick up a fuss!

paulm17781

The cash is ring fenced. Dublin is getting most as it needs it most. Realistically they were quite generous to the rest of the country. They're just spending it in the wrong places outside of Dublin (and quite a lot wrong in Dublin).

invincibleirish

paulm17781 wrote: »

The cash is ring fenced. Dublin is getting most as it needs it most. Realistically they were quite generous to the rest of the country. They're just spending it in the wrong places outside of Dublin (and quite a lot wrong in Dublin).

Oh im in complete agreement with that, but you miss my point, the politicians will be mad, Ring fenced? ha, just wait til a Cullen 2.0 gets to transport or likewise after whatever election, then we'll see

Sponge Bob

invincibleirish wrote: »

I cant wait for the situation in 2013 when the transfer budget will be entirely spent on the Interconnector & Metro North, leaving nothing for other road and rail projects.

The Contingency ( alone ) for Metro West , Metro North and the Interconnector....and a few Luasy bits... is 3 Years of current NRA funding or €5bn . This figure is frozen irrespective of whether a scheme is a PPP or funded by the taxpayer in full.

This is the amount they hope they don't have to spend but might have to and thats becuase nobody can cost a rail project accurately in Dublin .

3 Luas lines ( the 2 + Airport) were costed at £300m ( €360m ) in 1994 while 2 , in the end, cost €900m .

It certainly freaked the Dept of Finance who started squealing like a pig for cuts in the NRA budget to cross subsidise Dublin Rail .

Finance has also run some traffic projections based on lower populations in many areas and €2 a litre petrol from 2011 onwards. Needless to say they do not seem to show an increase in car traffic in Cavan/Leitrim.

Finance will therefore only entertain financing a road project where there are 20k + car movements today, 2008 . Most of those roads are already built or being built with very few pipelined even now . The bulk of the projected road projects now handle 5-15k cars per day

Once some politician realises that nothing is being spent on transport outside of Dublin then he is gonna kick up a fuss!

Most likely they will have an early election , in 2010 while roads are still being built ( and plenty more promised), and will then hack the **** out of the roads budget afterwards. The politicians need only lie from now to January 2010 ....and thats easy is it not ??

I would be amazed if the NRA got more than €500m-700m a year after 2010 anyway . The Govt and Dept of Finance (both) figure that the sheep who vote FF will have forgotten when the 2015 election comes about .

darkman2

The money is there for these projects as far as im aware. If not they can borrow anyway id have persumed.

murphaph

darkman2 wrote: »

The money is there for these projects as far as im aware

under the mattress? The money isn't in an account somewhere. It's based on economic projections and projections of tax revenue. If these are overly optimistic than the money isn't there.

It should always be an option to borrow for capital infrastructure like this of course.

spacetweek

murphaph wrote: »

under the mattress? The money isn't in an account somewhere. It's based on economic projections and projections of tax revenue. If these are overly optimistic than the money isn't there.

It should always be an option to borrow for capital infrastructure like this of course.

What's the situation with this re EU borrowing limits - would we be hamstrung by rules like this? Infrastructure development is a big thing all across Europe right now with the Trans European Corridors with high speed rail and Eastern European motorways/railway rehabilitation so preventing states from raising finance would not make sense.

murphaph

None of the other EU countries seem to be bothered by borrowing limits but in any case, our national debt is one of the lowest as a proportion of GDP in the whole union. We can borrow easily-the question is, will we?