by Louise Doyle

DONEGAL’S biggest infrastructure project will not be impacted by the standstill of the A5 project in the North, the Donegal News understands.

In February last year €600m was committed for the A5 North-West Transport corridor and work advancing on related Trans-European transport network (TEN-T) upgrades in Donegal and Monaghan.

The TEN-T project includes major road improvements, bypasses of Letterkenny, Ballybofey/Stranorlar and Lifford, along with over 60km of safe and segregated walking and cycling and eight ‘Modal Shift Hubs’ which would allow road users to switch to active travel and public transport.

The project will improve connectivity between Donegal and the rest of Ireland, also benefiting reliability and journey times for public transport. At Strabane, it will connect to the A5, improving transport links to ports and airports.

But uncertainty for the A5 project arose after Mr Justice Gerry McAlinden in the North ruled at the end of June that the Department for Infrastructure had failed to show the decision was compatible with statutory climate change targets.

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He acknowledged that his decision would bring “fresh anguish” to those affected by accidents on the existing A5 road and that one of the primary justifications for the construction of the new road “is that it will be much safer than the existing road”.

However, he said the “principle of the rule of law cannot be subverted, even if the motivation for doing so is to achieve what is deemed to constitute a clear societal benefit”.

Subsequently, the North’s Department for Infrastructure served a notice of appeal against a High Court ruling quashing a decision to proceed with the first phase of the A5 dual carriageway project.

Infrastructure Minister in the North, Liz Kimmins, confirmed that the decision to quash approval for the £1.2 billion A5 dual-carriageway has now been lodged by her Department ahead of the deadline on Friday last, for the proceedings to take place.

In a statement to this newspaper on foot of a query we lodged asking if the TEN-T project would be impacted by the A5 standstill, a spokesperson for the Department of Transport said: “There is no impact on the delivery of the Donegal TEN-T project from the recent development on the A5.”

The spokesperson added that it is expected that the planning documentation for the project will be published by later this year.