West=On=Track - News

West on Track welcomes decentralisation and calls for logical next step

Press Release
December 3rd 2003

The West on Track community campaign has welcomed the announcement of the decentralisation of sections of 2 Government Departments to Claremorris and Knock Airport. A spokesman said that this initiative indicates that the message is getting through at last, that the West has a central role to play in relieving the pressure on Dublin.

The inescapable logic of this very welcome announcement is that these centres, Claremorris and Knock Airport (via Charlestown), must be provided with proper transport infrastructure linking them to Sligo, Galway and Limerick. The Western Rail Corridor offers an immediate and economical opportunity to do just that. Civil servants coming West will rightly expect, as indeed do all our citizens, that modern rail and transport services will allow them easy access to the main cities, hospitals and centres of education in the West.

We look forward now to the logical next step which is the public commitment by the Government to the re-opening of the Western Rail Corridor and the announcement of the phased plan for its renewal.

In this context, we are pleased to announce that West on Track will shortly publish a detailed line survey and costed business plan, prepared by experts, which will make an irrefutable case for the viability of the West's most important piece of unused infrastructure.