National road network funding slashed

Funding for maintaining the national road network is to be cut by as much as 30%, local authorities have been told.

In what has been described as “an extraordinary step”, the head of Transport Infrastructure Ireland’s (TII) network operations has written to chief executives of each local authority saying he found it necessary to warn them of the scale of the cutbacks they will have to implement in their 2018 budgets, and the challenge they will face in maintaining the national roads network in their region.

Most local authorities have at this stage prepared and adopted their 2018 budgets, anticipating the same level of funding as 2017 from the TII for ordinary maintenance.