The National Roads Authority wants to be granted discretion in altering the routes of the State's major roads when planning issues arise during construction.
Its chief executive, Mr Michael Tobin, has said the current planning process means that bringing about even the most minor changes can be cumbersome.
He also warned that the NRA would be in favour of less public consultation on major roads projects.
While the public had the right to object to a construction project if, for example, a significant archaeological find was made, the NRA should have more discretion as to how these issues could be overcome, he said.
Currently, if the NRA wants to make changes to any approved road route it must restart the planning process from the beginning, including a public consultation period.
Mr Tobin said he had already written to the Minister for the Environment, Mr Cullen, and had raised a number of issues which could be considered when new legislation was being framed.
Addressing a hearing of the joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport, Mr Tobin said: "In the authority's opinion the situation warrants examination with a view to providing for some flexibility, under defined criteria, to vary or depart from the approved road scheme where the circumstances so warrant without the need to again undergo the full statutory approval process."
He was in favour of the NRA "being allowed some latitude to resolve minor difficulties".
Mr Tobin said a system should be established which would more easily define what a national monument was. At present it was the courts which ruled on this issue. "With all due respect to the courts, that's a very cumbersome mechanism to determine what a national monument is," he said.
On public consultation on new road projects he said: "I think we may reduce that, and it won't draw a lot of fire on us if we do". When a number of proposed routes for one new road were published people "got in a tizzy" because they believed all the routes "would land on them" even though only one road was being proposed.
In a joint presentation with Meath County Council the NRA defended the proposed routeing of the M3, which will stretch 49 kilometres from the end of the Clonee bypass to north of Kells. The council and the authority said 10 routes had been considered in four broad categories.
All had been considered under 18 headings, including cost, agriculture, ecology and community impact. The approved route had scored first, or joint first, under 14 of the 18 headings.
The authority and council said the approved route would lead to traffic reductions of between 75 and 90 per cent in Dunshaughlin, Kells and Navan.
The route was farther away from the archaeological site at the Hill of Tara than the existing N3. Some three archaeological sites impacted by the construction would be fully excavated.
The NRA was the biggest investor in archaeology in the State. Its 2003 archaeological expenditure exceeded €1 million on each of its six road schemes, with total expenditure reaching almost €3 million in one case.
