Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 18 November 2021
160. Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív asked the Minister for Transport when the National Investment Framework for Transport will be published; the proposed purpose of the framework; the elements that will be contained in same; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [56720/21]
Amharc ar fhreagraThe National Investment Framework for Transport in Ireland (NIFTI) is the Department of Transport’s new high-level strategic framework for prioritising future investment in the land transport network. NIFTI is currently being revised following public consultation and it is expected that the final version of the framework will be brought to Government for approval and published before the end of this year.
NIFTI has been developed to ensure that sectoral investment in transport is aligned with the National Planning Framework and supports the delivery of the ten National Strategic Outcomes. Transport investment is essential to realising our spatial and climate change objectives, and it is therefore crucial that we have developed this strategy which is aligned with and supports Government’s overarching policy objectives. NIFTI sits alongside other Departmental and Government policy and strategies, such as the Climate Action Plan, National Development Plan and forthcoming Sustainable Mobility Policy.
The framework establishes four investment priorities to ensure that transport investment is aligned with these overarching policy aims, and delivered in a sustainable and proportionate manner. The four priorities are:
1. Decarbonisation;
2. Protection and Renewal;
3. Mobility of People and Goods in Urban Areas; and
4. Enhanced Regional and Rural Connectivity.
To ensure that NIFTI supports the National Planning Framework in the most sustainable and cost-effective manner possible, it establishes modal and intervention hierarchies to supplement the Investment Priorities. The modal hierarchy will ensure that the most environmentally sustainable feasible solution to a given transport need is deployed on a given project. Project sponsors will have to consider walking and cycling before public transport, and public transport before private transport. If a solution from further down the hierarchy is proposed, project sponsors will have to justify why a more environmentally sustainable solution is not suitable for the problem at hand.
Similarly, the intervention hierarchy will require project sponsors to first consider maintenance and then optimisation of existing assets. Only when these more conservative solutions have been demonstrated to be unsuitable will significant improvement of existing infrastructure or outright new infrastructure be considered.
The hierarchies are not rigid tools. Their role is to ensure that for a given transport need or problem the most appropriate solution is deployed, but investment will remain principles-based and objectives-led. Where project sponsors can demonstrate that solutions from higher on either hierarchy are infeasible solutions to meet the objectives of a given investment, it follows that solutions from further down the hierarchy will be considered.
