LAST UPDATE | 20 Feb

TRAIN SERVICES BETWEEN Dublin and Belfast are set to increase to hourly frequency as part of an €800 million package announced by the Irish government today.

The money is being released through the government’s Shared Island Fund initiative, which is aimed at building consensus across the island of Ireland.

€600 million is allocated to the proposed upgrade of the A5 road, with €50 million for the redevelopment of Casement Park GAA stadium in west Belfast, which is expected to host matches during the Euro 2028 football tournament.

The revamped Casement Park would have a capacity of 34,578 when finished and is one of 10 host venues earmarked for the 2028 Uefa European Championships.

The stadium has been out of use since 2013 when planning permission for the project was first granted, but the plans were later scrapped and replaced by a new proposal in 2017 that has struggled to come to fruition. 

The GAA announced in 2021 that construction would begin the following year but there have been several setbacks and legal challenges.

Campaigners have long called for upgrades to the A5, which has been the site of a high number of fatal collisions.  

€12.5 million will go to increasing the frequency of the Belfast/Dublin rail link to hourly services.

Funding will also be put toward building the Narrow Water Bridge to connect the Cooley Peninsula in Co Louth to the Mourne Mountains in Co Down. 

Cabinet ministers approved the funding package at a meeting this morning.

In a statement, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said that “this funding is about all-island investment, boosting the all-island economy and improving connections North and South, benefiting both jurisdictions and all communities”.

It is about understanding that, whatever the constitutional future of Ireland brings, investing in people, in quality of life, in opportunity, and for the generations to come, are all of our responsibilities and a common good we can best progress by working together.”

DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson welcomed the announcement but said that funding for infrastructure in Northern Ireland should be coming from the UK government.

He cast doubt on whether sufficient funding will be raised for the Casement Park redevelopment, saying that “it is right that the GAA receives its allocation from the Northern Ireland Executive as previously agreed and in line with the allocations to the three supporting bodies but we cannot see how significant additional UK taxpayer resources will be available at a time when other vital public services are in need of additional resource and capital allocations”.

The A5 funding, meanwhile, was “good news” for campaign group Enough is Enough, whose chair, Niall McKenna, said the road project will be expensive but that the “cost of not going ahead” would be “more death and more tragedy”.