page_title: History of roads in Ireland
section_title: Road improvements: 1980s and 1990s
hierarchical_section_title: History of roads in Ireland / 20th century onwards / Road improvements: 1980s and 1990s
caption_attribution_description: The R132 road in Swords, Dublin, Ireland
context_page_description: There have been routes and trackways in Ireland connecting settlements and facilitating trade since ancient times and the country now has an extensive network of public roads connecting all parts of the island.
context_section_description: In 1979, in the wake of new EU laws and with the availability of EU funding, a strategic plan for the development of the national road network was published, entitled "Road Development Plan for the 1980s". The plan's main aims were:
  the provision of an adequate strategic inter-urban road system connecting the principal towns, seaports and airports
  the adoption of a minimum two-lane standard for the national route network with higher standards for particular sections
  the provision of bypasses of a number of towns on the national routes
  a programme of new river crossings, ring roads and relief routes in the cities and other major urban centres
  The National Development Plan (1989–1993) set out a programme of road improvements costed at €1,257 million (1989 prices): it "included thirty-four major improvement projects involving the provision of dual carriageway or motorway on 290 kilometres of national primary routes"; another 290 kilometers were to be upgraded to wide single carriageway standard (7.3-metre carriageway plus two 3-metre hard shoulders). A further €3,316 million (1994 prices) was spent on national primary routes between 1994 and 1999. Four key strategic corridors were identified for major improvements. These programmes meant that by the end of 1993, 35% of the national road network was "adequate or improved", 53% (with improvements to another 11% of the network underway) by the end of 1999.
  Some changes were made to the national road network in the 1980s and 1990s. In 1980, two national secondary roads (N84 and N85) were added to the network with the N86 being added in 1986. These roads had previously been either Trunk or regional roads. In 1994, three national secondary roads (N57, N64, N79) were reclassified as national primary road roads and subsequently renumbered (N57 to N26, N64 to part N18, N79 to N30) while a section of the N60 between Castlebar and Westport in Co. Mayo was reclassified as part of the N5. A section of the N56 between Letterkenny and Stranorlar in Co. Donegal was reclassified as a southern section of the N13.
  Four other national primary routes (N27, N28, N29, N31) and one national secondary route (N87, previously part of the R200 and R202 regional roads) were added to the network and the regional road between Killarney and Killorglin in Co. Kerry became part of the N72. A section of the R600 regional road between Cork city centre and Cork Airport was reclassified as the N27, the N28 was partly newly constructed and partly a reclassified section of regional road (R609), the N29 was newly constructed and the N31 was made up of roads previously classified as regional roads. The N32 was added in 1996 and the N33 was added after its completion.
  The National Roads Authority (NRA) was established on a statutory basis by the Roads Act 1993 from 1 January 1994: "the Authority's primary function, under the Roads Act 1993, is 'to secure the provision of a safe and efficient network of national roads'. For this purpose, it has overall responsibility for planning and supervision of construction and maintenance works on these roads." Apart from the construction and maintenance of motorways and national roads, the NRA is responsible for providing traffic signs on national roads. Many of the larger schemes (some of which are tolled) initiated by the NRA have been built through public-private partnership (PPP) arrangements which "has resulted in €2.1billion of private sector funding being secured for national road schemes."
caption: Dual-carriageway bypass near Swords, Co. Dublin originally built in 1984 as the N1, now the R132.
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