Motorway a year ahead of schedule despite Tara row
PROGRESS: M3 set to open early as heritage protests continue
Friday September 12 2008
THE CONTROVERSIAL motorway which sparked the Tara row is nearly a year ahead of schedule.
It is hoped the M3, which passes through the Tara-Skryne valley in Meath, will open to traffic before the official completion date of June 2010.
Meath County Council's road safety officer Michael Finnegan welcomed the progress. He said motorways are acknowledged as the safest type of roads.
Transport Minister Noel Dempsey, who is a Meath TD, said the M3 will cut journey times and increase safety.
Commuters
He said it will also improve the quality of life for Meath-based commuters.
But environmental group TaraWatch repeated its call for the project to be cancelled.
It wants a heritage trail to be created instead. A national monument was discovered in the middle of one of the lanes of the motorway last year.
TaraWatch said the motorway is a waste of taxpayers' money, but the council insisted the motorway will boost the county as a business location.
The 60km motorway will link the Meath towns of Clonee and Kells, bypassing Dunshaughlin, and Navan, with a toll at either end.
TaraWatch spokesman Vincent Salafia said: "The economic justification for the NDP (National Development Plan) and the M3 has evaporated, with the economic downturn, and it is economic suicide to carry on as if nothing has happened."
In July, the World Archaeological Congress (WAC) urged the Government to ensure no large commercial or residential development is allowed along the route of the M3.
The forum, made up of practising archaeologists, also said that excavations carried out along the motorway route, which runs near the hill of Tara, were performed to the "highest professional standards".
The organisation said it is opposed to any further development along the stretch of motorway and called on the Government to develop protection measures for the site.
"Tara has significance far beyond Ireland itself," President of the WAC, Professor Claire Smith said.
- Cormac Murphy
