National Development Plan 2022-2030

Wouldn't it be better just to have a single thread for the NDP for discussing all aspects of it? The theme of this NDP is likely to be which projects made it at the expense of others, and probably whether certain public transport projects made it at the expense of certain road projects, or vica versa.

Cork Suburban Rail is a quarter of a billion but it seems pretty ambitious for 8 new stations, electrification, dual tracking to Midleton etc, it will come to about half a billion when all is said and done imo.

Is NDP money Capex only or does it include Opex over that period too? I'm sure specific project allocations are Capex only but the overall funding envelope might include Opex too.

I would assume that DART Underground/DART+Tunnel will have funding allocated for this new plan being unveiled for all to see from tomorrow. But the questions that will remain is how much funding will be allocated to it & where will the money come from to actually fund & build it? Those to me are the key questions that we want to see answered about DART+ Tunnel because again it does need to be both a project of real value from a financial pov & a practical and worthwhile pov in the longer term. Answers like this need to be sought when other things are added into the mix like housing which has provisions for it to be provided by the LDA to allow it build new housing around the lands of Inchicore Depot.

Anyone know at what time this is being published at?

That tends to matter less than the fact that there is one. anything can happen over the next decade anyway but it gives the impression there's a determination by the current government to do something. Now we just have to see how much of this stuff they actually manage to do. If they can even get half of it right it takes the wind out of SFs sails on housing, not the primary aim but a welcome secondary one from the perspective of the two large parties.  

Noticeable too that SF are straight out of the blocks to complain about  it.

Metrolink has a date of completion of TBC. Imagine having a National Development Plan which includes the largest infrastructure project in the state's history and plonking a big "TBC" as the completion date. Loving the commitment.

Some of that is the purview of the Northern authorities, we've done the track part of it. There is a high speed Belfast - Dublin- Cork proposal in the region of €15bn.

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Will there be a breakdown of funding towards specific rail lines on the network or just a €x billion for maintainence and upgrade of the existing network?

The Ballybrophy line for example is long overdue being modernised. Completing the CWR track relay for the entire line and upgrading signaling, automating gates etc

Publishing costs for projects like Metrolink in the NDP would be meaningless anyway. Projects have to pass through the various stages of the Spending Code and it is the costs at those stages that matter. The Preliminary Business Case for Metrolink will be submitted soon but obviously a lot can change between now and RO approval. Same with DART+ where design isn't finalised yet.

The NDP really is just a list of projects which will be funded up until the big decision has to be made, which is award of the construction contract. Only then are actual costs known. Being in the NDP probably doesn't really mean a whole lot (see Ryan's comments on some road projects not happening), but not being in it means the project is dead for at least a decade. Ideally there would be some kind of quarterly or half yearly update on the projects included with cost estimates at the various PSC stages included.

Monard was supposed to be a new town built outside Cork on the Cork-Dublin mainline. First set out in the Cork Area Strategic Plan in 2001, it was envisaged to have 13,000 residents within a decade. In 2009 the Cork County Development Plan said the plan was to have 7,800 residents and the train station built on the mainline by 2020. Today it remains agri land with not a single sod turned or real plan in place. The train station remains a fantasy which is rolled out every now and again in various masterplans. An epic public policy and implementation failure.