Reply To: Ramp at Connolly

New Luas link to the Point could cost an extra €50m

THE Luas light railway may be extended 1.6km from Dublin’s Connolly Station to the Point Theatre – at a cost of €50m . . . or €31,250 per metre.

It would end the long slog on foot for music fans from the city centre to the Point and improve public transport for 30,000 people due to live and work in the north docks area.

If the line is approved by Transport Minister Seamus Brennan, the cost will be shared by Dublin City Council, the capital’s Docklands Development Authority, private docklands developers and the State’s Railway Procurement Agency, which unveiled the new line yesterday.

Developers building high-rise apartments and office blocks in the rapidly-growing north docklands – between the IFSC and the Point – have been hit with a levy to pay for more than half the cost.

The Railway Procurement Agency said it will make a compelling business case to the minister for the line, following a period of public consultation. It could be completed by 2006.

However, possibly extending Luas to the Point raised serious questions yesterday about the decision three years ago to remove the approach ramp to Connolly Station at a cost of €30m to allow Luas enter the station at ground level.

Had the ramp been left in place there could have been a stop at Harbourmaster Place, at the rear of the station. This would have allowed passengers journey from Connolly to the Point without first having to enter the station and be ‘reversed out,’ as would now happen. Work on removing the ramp is continuing this week.

RPA chief executive Frank Allen said the ramp was being taken away on foot of a rail order, following a public inquiry relating to extension of the Tallaght-Middle Abbey Street line to Connolly Station.

Any question of keeping it was now “academic” and “would not make any sense at this stage”.

The agency would prepare a business case for extending the line, including how to fund it.

DDDA chief executive Peter Coyne said 20,000 people would work in the area by 2006 and a further 10,000 would live there.

Three possible routes for the line, called C1, have selected, with a final choice to be made within the next three months.

Route options are:

* Double track, extending from the Luas terminal stop at Connolly Station across the junction of Harbourmaster Place and Mayor Street along this street, across a bridge over the Royal Canal and continuing towards a Point Depot terminus.

* A second option is double track from Busarus, turning north along Harbourmaster Place and east of Connolly towards the IFSC entrance. A single track would continue through the laneway beside Connolly Station into Sheriff Street and continue eastwards before turning south to run along Commons Street, east along Mayor Street, crossing the Royal Canal and on to the Point.

* Third option is a single-line loop along Harbourmaster Place down the laneway east of Connolly, onto Sheriff Street, Commons Street and Mayor Street, with links between Busarus and Connolly Luas stops.

Treacy Hogan
Environment Correspondent