Plans for a Belfast Underground are gathering momentum as the city's population is expected to treble to a over a million in the next 15 years.

Arthur Acheson, qualified city planner and a partner in the Boyd Partnership on the Ravenhill Road has said such a project should be part of a transformation of the city's image and infrastructure.

The scheme has not been costed but Mr Acheson's vision includes a Metro system which would by 2020 link new developments such as Titanic Quarter and Laganside with universities, hospitals, schools, and bus and rail stations. It could be public sector led and built with private sector investment negotiated under existing "planning gain" legislation.

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Mr Acheson said: "Belfast has a brief opportunity to draw up an integrated plan which will co-ordinate the £5bn worth of private sector investment which has already been committed for the next 10 years.

"The Belfast Metropolitan Area Plan inquiry continues apace, but this is a plan which is already 10 years out of date. The new BMAP plan is not due until at least 2009 and it will run for just six years until 2015, or perhaps, if it is stretched, to 2018."

Mr Acheson called for an end to outdated thinking and further entrenchment into unsustainable infrastructure.

(GK/JM)