Aontú leader slams new delay to Navan rail line as Meath commuters ‘lose patience’
Aontú leader Peadar Tóibín has hit out at yet another delay to the long-promised Navan-to-Dublin rail line, saying progress on key infrastructure has been “glacial,” leaving “hundreds of thousands of people” affected.
This week it was confirmed that the Railway Order for the project will now be submitted by the end of 2027, rather than in 2026 as originally planned.
Speaking in the Dáil, the Meath West TD said commuter traffic from the county to Dublin had reached “crisis levels,” with the M3 motorway backed up “well inside county Meath” during rush hour.
“Meath is the biggest commuter county in the country. 90,000 people travel to work outside the county, and 60,000 are forced to use cars for the lack of a rail line,” Deputy Tóibín said.
“Navan is the largest town in Ireland without a rail line.”
The Aontú leader said residents were “losing patience” with decades of broken promises.
He recalled that the Navan-Dublin rail link was first pledged in 1994, with completion originally set for 2015. More recently, the project was expected to begin by 2030 and be finished by 2036 — a timeline he described as “horizon politics.”
“This promise, to be honest, was met with derision in Meath. People felt the Government was putting the project so far in the distance that it would never happen. 2036, the proposed delivery date, is 42 years after the rail line was first promised by Fianna Fáil,” he said.
Mr Tóibín noted that the original Navan-to-Dublin rail line, built in 1862, took just three years to complete “with picks and shovels.”
“Now, with all the technology that exists today, it’s taking 42 years to deliver,” he said.
He said congestion in the Greater Dublin Area was already costing the economy €336m a year, a figure expected to rise to €1.5bn by 2040, and added that the Government had created “one of the slowest planning and permitting systems in the EU.”
Mr Tóibín also criticised recent increases in tolls on the M50 and Port Tunnel, arguing that motorists are being “penalised” while public transport options remain out of reach.
“Commuters can pay up to €3,000 a year on tolls to sit in traffic for hours without a public transport alternative. It’s high time the Government ended the bureaucratic and red-tape nightmare that has left so many people stranded without key infrastructure,” he concluded.