Cost of A5 tops £110m before work has started

THE Department for Infrastructure’s Stormont committee has been told that the costs for the proposed A5 dual carriageway, which will pass through large parts of West Tyrone, have now topped £110 million – before the road has even been built.

Officials from the DfI revealed the figure – which covers the period from 2007 until 2024 – at a meeting last week.

It is expected that the Irish Government will allocate 32 per-cent of the overall cost of the road, although officials said that this was down from 47 per-cent.

Infrastructure Minister, John O’Dowd, is expected to make a final decision over whether the scheme should go ahead by the end of this summer.

Project Director for the A5 at the DfI, Colin Hutchinson, said it was their intention to put a series of papers on the road to the Executive over the coming months. This was, he added, with a view to a decision being taken towards the end of the summer.

The DfI said that they had met with as many stakeholders as possible in relation to the scheme.

They added that this included members of the Alternative A5 Alliance (AA5A), which has been opposed to the scheme and wants other alternatives to be considered.

However, a DfI official said that no amount of interventions or safety schemes would have the same impact on safety as an off-line dual carriageway.

They cited the approximate 95 per-cent reduction in the number of fatalities on the A4 dual carriageway between Ballygawley and Dungannon as an example of the benefits of an off-line route.

But they added that a number of improvement schemes were currently being considered. Among them were improved markings and signs.

Speed limits were also being examined, although it was pointed out that the speed of vehicles on the route during daylight hours is already quite low.

Infrastructure committee chair, Deborah Erskine, of the DUP, said she found the A5 currently a ‘really scary’ road to drive on.

She said it was important that the views of all stakeholders in relation to the road are heard.

“The volume of traffic on the A5 is completely different than it was 50 years ago,” she said.