The proposed N9 motorway/ dual carriageway linking Waterford to Dublin is seen as the "number one priority" for transport investment in the South East regional planning guidelines, ahead of other road schemes and rail improvements.
There is no shortage of plans and projects in the South East, which is centred on Waterford. The regional authority, in partnership with county councils in the region, is managing the State's largest public broadband rollout, costing €14 million. It involves constructing almost 100kms of fibre-optic cables in the region's main urban areas - Carlow, Clonmel, Dungarvan, Kilkenny, Waterford and Wexford - as part of a plan to update communications technology.
A passenger transport strategy for the South East has also been produced with the emphasis on improving services on both the Waterford-Dublin and Rosslare-Dublin lines and re-opening the Rosslare-Limerick line to a better standard.
A joint waste-management plan includes provision of an incinerator, which is targeted to be in place by 2009. Elected members of the region's six local authorities baulked at this plan so it had to be adopted by their managers instead.
Faced with an unsustainable pattern of low-density sprawl, Waterford City Council commissioned a 20-year planning, land- use and transportation study.
Its key aim is to ensure that the city develops a critical mass as the region's economic driver.
It seeks improved access for all through the provision of high-quality, bus-based public transport, an orbital road network and additional river crossings, and the location of new housing as close as possible to job opportunities and bus routes.
The regional plan concedes that inward migration, particularly from Dublin, has been the "major driver" of population growth in the South East in recent years and, if left unchecked, this trend could alter the National Spatial Strategy.
However, though it anticipates that migration from Dublin will level off or even fall, the plan sees it as a benefit that there is a young, well-educated and motivated workforce available to participate in the region's industrial and economic growth.
"The number one priority must be N9 motorway/dual carriageway linking Waterford to Dublin," the plan says. But it also calls for the WaterfordCorkLimerick-Galway corridor to be developed as as a "networked counterbalance" to Dublin.
Under the spatial strategy, it is envisaged that Waterford, the South East's gateway, and the "hubs" of Kilkenny and Wexford would develop as a "growth triangle", complemented by growth in the undesignated county towns of Carlow, Clonmel and Dungarvan.
The population of the region is projected at 500,000 by 2020 - an 18 per cent increase on the figure for 2002 - and the plan says the real challenge would be to ensure that growth happens in areas with a good physical and social infrastructure.
Waterford is to be developed as a "compact city" of 70,000 (up from 45,000 today), with some 50,000 living within 20 minutes commuting time. Other towns in the region are to be made more attractive as places to live.
The plan seeks to deliver "enhanced regional accessibility" to air services, building on the "important regional asset" of Waterford Airport, and to develop the ports of Bellview and Rosslare because of their strategic importance to the region.
No price tag is put on the investment programme, though the development of Public Private Partnerships on a value-for-money basis is mentioned as "an important option to assist the implementation of the regional development strategy".
The deadline for public submissions on the draft South East Regional Planning Guidelines is April 28th. The document may be obtained via the Internet at www.sera.ie/rpgs
