Cross-Border Bridge Plans Gathering Pace

Plans for a cross-border bridge between Northern Ireland and the Republic are gathering pace, the Examiner newspaper has reported.

Chief executives from Newry and Mourne Council met their counterparts from Louth County Council to discuss the €17m Narrow Water bridge project, which would connect the A2 near Warrenpoint to the R173 near Omeath.

The bridge would span the Clanrye River about a mile north of its entrance to Carlingford Lough within sight of the 16th-century Narrow Water Castle tower house.

This meeting in Warrenpoint Town Hall was the first time the chief executives discussed the plans in public.

The project is competing for cash from a €30m funding pot from the Special EU Programmes Body and its backers want to make sure planning permission is in place as soon as money is gathered.

Supporter Jim Boylan heralded the co-operation inherent in the plans, saying this was "the first cross border bridge project since the creation of both states and the first simultaneous planning application for an infrastructural project on both sides of the border".

He said the next stage would be to progress to compulsory purchases.

Political supporters include South Down MP Margaret Ritchie of the SDLP, South Down MLA Catriona Ruane of Sinn Fein and Louth TD Gerry Adams.

The only currently available route between the two sides of the river is a half-hour drive north, through Newry, and south again.

(NE)