Vol. 501 No. 4
122 Mr. Durkan asked the Minister for the Environment and Local Government when the public inquiry will take place in respect of the proposed motorway link to facilitate Celbridge and Leixlip, County Kildare; when site works will commence; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6464/99]
134 Mr. Durkan asked the Minister for the Environment and Local Government when a motorway link will be provided for Celbridge, County Kildare; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6479/99]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 122 and 134 together.
Kildare County Council submitted an environmental impact statement, EIS, for the proposed Celbridge interchange on 27 October 1998 and submitted a motorway scheme on 4 November 1998. I will appoint an inspector to hold a public inquiry into the motorway scheme in the near future. The date and time of the public inquiry will be advertised in due course in the national press. The question of the commencement of site works does not arise at this stage of the process.
123 Mr. Durkan asked the Minister for the Environment and Local Government if his attention has been drawn to the urgent need for major road improvements and realignments in Kildare North; if he will make the necessary funds available to the authorities under his aegis to carry out these works in 1999; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6465/99]
The maintenance-improvement of non-national roads in its area is a matter for Kildare County Council, to be funded from its own resources, supplemented by allocations from the local government fund. The council was allocated a total of £8.055 million in non-national road grants for 1999 on 1 February 1999, an increase of 14 per cent on the original 1998 allocation.
As regards national roads, nearly £312 million is being made available through my Department's Vote in 1999 for the improvement of national roads, an increase of 18 per cent over 1998. Responsibility for the allocation of this funding to individual projects lies with the National Roads Authority.
