Dunkettle contract may take further year

It could take another year to award a new construction contract for the major upgrade works at the Dunkettle Interchange.

Paul Moran, regional manager of the South-West roads capital programme for Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII), said he hopes the project will be completed by 2023 but said the TII faces serious challenges to meet many of its deadlines.

Mr Moran was addressing Southern Construct 2019, a construction industry conference in Cork yesterday. He gave a detailed update on the major roads projects in the southern region.

He told the conference that the new tender process for the main contract at Dunkettle began this week but it would take “10 to 12 months” to complete, after which time the business case would have to be sent to the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform.

Mr Moran also outlined delays in other major roads projects, including the M28 Ringaskiddy motorway, which he said is unlikely to see main building works until 2023 “at the earliest”.

Construction Industry Federation director general Tom Parlon said the update was depressing and that the projects were much needed. He bemoaned the delays in Dunkettle, in particular.

“Are you saying that the industry was ripping off the country or did someone get the figures wrong? With all the other challenges that are there, here was a major project that we could have gotten over the line and you pull it,” he said.

Mr Moran said that TII has a responsibility to “deliver value” to the exchequer.

“We felt, given what we knew, that going back out to the market to get some commercial tension in there was in the interest of the public exchequer,” he said.