The first motorway section in the state was the M7 Naas by-pass, which opened in 1983. On 29 January 2008, the Department of Transport published notice of the Minister's intention to make the orders being sought and invited submissions or observations to be made to the Minister regarding the NRA's applications. The scheme drew national attention during the preliminary archaeological investigations in January 2006 when over 500 human skeletons from the seventh century were discovered at the townland of Parknahown just south of The Manor Stone service area at Ballacolla, Co. Laois opened in 2015. Under Irish legislation (the The following table shows a list of motorways currently open in Ireland. The motorway network is focused on Legal authority for motorways existed in the Special Roads Act (Northern Ireland) 1963, similar to that in the M. Herity: The Pre-historic period – internal and external communicationsde Paor: The Early Historic Period – Monks and Traders, 24–25. The M7 motorway (Irish: Mótarbhealach M7) is a motorway in Ireland.The motorway runs continuously from the outskirts of Naas in County Kildare to Rossbrien on the outskirts of Limerick City.

M7: Limerick – Shannon motorway tunnel, 10 km (6 miles) long, opened ahead of schedule on 27 July 2010. Numbered roads were initially divided into two classes, A roads and B roads, with motorways being added to the system from the 1960s. It is hoped to build an extensive database reflecting Irish lives, giving them a chance to be heard, remembered and to add their voice to the historical record. The origins of this system lie in pre-independence legislation: the preliminary section of Evidence that the Trunk Road and Link Road classification and numbering system had been well established by the 1950s is found in This current system of road classification, numbering and network management has its origins in the late 1960s. The section opened to traffic on 25 May 2009, some nine months ahead of the original target completion date.This section of the M8 was the penultimate part of the motorway to enter the construction phase, in June 2007. In chronological order, the various sections opened as follows (status on opening in brackets): The M9 (linking Dublin to Carlow) was opened on Monday the 21st of December 2009 and was expanded in March 2010 to link Dublin to Waterford directly. Under Irish legislation (the The following table shows a list of motorways currently open in the Republic of Ireland.In 1983, the first sections of Irish motorway were opened: a short section of Ireland's motorway network began to expand significantly between 1990 and 1999. The M7 forms part of the Dublin to Limerick N7 national primary road.The section of the motorway bypassing Naas, an 8 km stretch, was the first section of motorway to open in the Republic of Ireland… The The first decade of the twenty-first century saw a major expansion in the construction of new motorways in Ireland, after an initially slow start. 2010: 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 Some changes were made to the national road network in the 1980s and 1990s.

Taylor and Skinner's Apart from roads themselves, traces of the turnpike roads exist physically as Although Ireland's road network was well developed by 1800, there were still many remote areas, especially in the western regions, that were not well served by roads.

Cork 1976Shane O'Donnell, 'How the M8 links our past and our future', O'Donnell, 'How the M8 links our past and our future' In 1973 Ireland …