Eamon Ryan brands A5 and ‘Derry road’ rail link ‘very expensive projects’ and warns 'no endless tap of money’ - video Dailymotion

Derry Journal

Eamon Ryan brands A5 and ‘Derry road’ rail link ‘very expensive projects’ and warns 'no endless tap of money’

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00:00 don't think this project can progress without an executive in place. I don't

00:06 need the legality of that but certainly politically we don't have

00:10 counterparts to even politically talk to about the projects at the moment in the

00:14 absence of an executive assembly so we do need that. I do have to recognize that

00:18 that connectivity to the Northwest is absolutely vital. The Strategic Rail

00:23 Review was important in that regard because as well as the A5 there was in

00:26 my mind the very important significant proposal in terms of spur from Port of

00:31 Down, Dungannon, Omas, Trabant, Leather County as well as Derry and I think that

00:36 also is a hugely significant but potentially beneficial project. Again all

00:41 these projects going to be very expensive I think was the latest estimate

00:44 of the executive is 1.6 billion sterling for the project now we're

00:48 commissioning 75 million we have committed 75 million to the project but

00:53 that's not 1.6 billion and the UK government is going to have to

00:57 obviously going to make key decision this in terms of their own exchequer

01:01 contribution but we will engage with them and with the Northern Assembly

01:06 executive once the executive is back in place.

01:09 Yeah look I understand that Minister and you know it's a great frustration to

01:15 everyone I think probably by the DUP that there isn't an executive up and

01:20 running we need to see it up and running we need to see it work and we need to

01:23 see it delivering for people and certainly the delivery of this road is

01:27 vital to that. Unfortunately for a long time now we've had and it's it's one of

01:33 the idiosyncrasies I suppose of the planning process on both sides of the

01:37 border particularly in the north where a small number of people who have been

01:40 objecting to this road for decades have been able to hold up its progress and we

01:44 certainly need to see the greater good delivered and the greater good is that

01:47 we have a road which is fit for purpose which can work for the people across the

01:51 north and I acknowledge you know the the all-island rail review and you know the

01:55 the impact of that and the possibility that it puts out there however the

01:58 reality is this road exists it needs to be improved it needs to be developed we

02:03 need to see new sections of it put in place the issue in regard to rail is

02:08 much further down the track if you'll pardon the pun and is a much more

02:12 difficult thing to try and deliver in the timescale that we need to see this

02:15 delivered because this road has been used by people every day to come and go

02:18 to work and they need to have an appropriate road in place.

02:23 I'm very familiar with the road and I go up to Donegal a lot and Derry but we do need an

02:30 all-island approach to transport and same way we need an all-island approach to the

02:33 environment and so many different areas but there is issues budget issues here

02:39 because as I said we have as I say every deputy here is going to list

02:43 as long as your arm of various projects that have to be funded and road building

02:48 in particular is increasingly expensive we're seeing that in recent tenders and

02:54 we often make to have to make hard choices and those hard choices have to

02:58 advance some projects over other money to fight some of the earlier

03:01 conversations it isn't an endless tap and it's not a that requires difficult

03:07 political decisions then if you're to if you're to invest further in some

03:10 projects it means you have to invest less than others and that presents real

03:14 political challenge.

Eamon Ryan brands A5 and ‘Derry road’ rail link ‘very expensive projects’ and warns 'no endless tap of money’

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