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METRO  

The RPA is preparing plans for a preferred route for the proposed metro line to Dublin airport. Currently it is envisaged that the line would commence at an underground station at St Stephen’s Green and continue underground serving Connolly station, O’Connell Street, the Mater Hospital and Botanic Road before surfacing at Dublin City University. The line would then run on an elevated alignment through Ballymun (where there would be two stops), Metropark (serving nearby industrial parks), before finishing at the airport.

The construction costs are estimated at approximately €1.5 billion at today’s prices. The line would be designed, financed and built by the private sector, with the state leasing it back over a 25-year period. At the end of that time the line would revert to state ownership.

Fingal County Council, in association with the RPA, has prepared plans for a €300 million extension of the metro line from the airport to Swords. This would essentially follow the line of the original N1 Swords by-pass and would terminate at a Park & Ride site just north of the town centre. The cost of the extension would be partly funded by special development levies similar to those proposed for the Sandyford-Cherrywood extension of the Luas Green Line and the Connolly-Point Depot extension of the Red Line.

DUBLIN RAIL PLANS

IÉ   presented   their   long-term    vision    for railways in the Dublin area, ‘Provision of a Fully Integrated Greater Dublin Rail System 2004-2010’, to the Oireachtas Committee on Transport in February. The proposed but not yet approved underground inter-connector tunnel between Spencer Dock (North Wall) and Heuston with underground stations at Pearse, St. Stephen’s Green, Christchurch and Heuston was seen as key to adding extra capacity to the DART and suburban network. The tunnel would be 5.2-km long and cost €1.3 billion.

The overall plan would see three DART lines. Existing south side DART trains would divert at Connolly to the Maynooth line instead of continuing on to Howth or Malahide as at present. The second DART line would commence at Heuston and run to Dublin Airport via the inter-connector, Spencer Dock and Howth Junction. A 4-km spur would connect the Dublin-Belfast line with the airport from a point 1-km north of Howth Junction. It would require an investment of €300m-€440m. Howth-Howth Junction would operate as a shuttle service.

The third service would start in Kildare and run to Drogheda via the inter-connector, with the lines being electrified. The plan proposes new twice-hourly peak time commuter services for towns such as Dundalk , Longford, Athlone, Portlaoise, Carlow and Gorey. Peak hour travel times to and from the centre of Dublin would be cut to 45 minutes for towns within a 50-km radius of the city and to 75 minutes for towns within a 100-km radius.

The inter-connector tunnel from Heuston to Spencer Dock would treble rail commuter capacity into and out of Dublin to 60,000 passengers per hour. It was described by IÉ as the "missing link" in the existing rail network, it would end the remoteness of Heuston and eliminate the bottleneck between Connolly and Tara Street stations that currently prevents additional commuter services being added. Electrifying lines to Drogheda and Maynooth, bringing the number of DART lines to three, could be completed for €620m.

Newspapers reported that direct rail services could also be run between Cork and Belfast , via central Dublin . As the Cork-Belfast route was recently identified as one of the cross-border rail projects to be supported by the EU, this offers the potential of accessing EU grants to help fund the project.

The plan notes that local services from Kildare could be extended from Heuston via the Phoenix Park tunnel to Spencer Dock for a cost of just €7m and within two years.

The entire plan, including rolling stock, would require an investment of €3billion and, if funding was provided, it could be "fast-tracked" to be in place by 2010.

The plan proposes to re-open the Navan line from Clonsilla through Dunboyne to a park-and-ride facility at Pace, near Fairyhouse Cross on the N3 road from Kells, Cavan, Navan and Dunshaughlin. In April, newspapers reported that IÉ would fund and carry out a feasibility study and preliminary design for the Dunboyne line project. The Director of Planning at Meath County Council, which sees the project as a vital boost for the area, said study costs were estimated by IÉ at about €670,000.

The Spencer Dock Development scheme presently under construction on the site of the North Wall freight yard will feature a three-platform railway station at surface level at Mayor Street Square, which is to the east of the site. The route of the possible underground inter-connector has been reserved and the location and design of buildings for the scheme ‘will not compromise the future construction of the underground link’. However, images of the scheme shown in national newspapers showed no rail lines or facilities.

DART UPGRADE

Work continues on the south side, with the line between Pearse and Greystones closed on Saturdays and Sundays. Weekend Rosslare trains operated between Greystones/Arklow and Rosslare in the pattern described in JOURNAL 153. The Mk IId set that terminated in Arklow on Sunday night was used to form Monday’s 06.45 Gorey-Dundalk as far as Dublin Connolly. As a consequence, Cravens were used on Monday’s 07.10 Maynooth-Rosslare Europort, 13.25 Rosslare Europort-Maynooth and 17.55 Maynooth-Rosslare Europort. Work was suspended on Saturday 13 March to allow trains operate for the Skyfest fireworks exhibition associated with St Patrick’s Day celebrations. These were held on the River Liffey quays and Tara Street station was closed from noon for crowd control reasons. Grand Canal Dock station was also closed. Work was also suspended for Saturday 1 May for the EU Day of the Welcomes.

During winter and spring, OHLE work continued using road-rail equipment. This included lorries as well as rail-mounted ‘cherry-pickers’. Using these machines, crews renewed 1,600-metres of double track conductor wire each weekend. A trial DART train was run each Monday morning when work was finished and before commercial services started.

Work continues on platform extensions at Booterstown, Salthill, Killiney and Shankill. This includes excavating the existing platforms, installing new drains and ducts. At Blackrock, both  platforms  have  been  excavated and new  drains  and  ducting  installed  apart from a short section at the south end of the up platform and the new extension of the down platform. Temporary hardcore surfaces were provided until the final asphalt surfaces were laid. In Dún Laoghaire , platforms have been finished with tarred surfaces and new lighting installed.

Construction of communications rooms is also progressing. They are at platform level under the station building in Shankill, in the station buildings in Booterstown and are separate structures in Dún Laoghaire and Salthill. New OHLE masts have been erected at Killiney, Dalkey, Seapoint and Sydney Parade.

Work commenced on renewing the OHLE and extending platforms on the Howth Junction-Howth Branch on Saturday 3 April. Work took place over seven weekends with complete line closure on the Saturday and Sunday.

From Good Friday 9 April to Easter Monday 12 April, all trains were suspended south of Connolly. Adjustments were made to the OHLE on the Loop Line during this closure.

Design work has been completed for the new south entrance at Tara Street .

Ticket Barriers   IÉ has advertised for the supply and installation of gating equipment and associated software and civil works in Dublin suburban stations. The system ‘must be capable of achieving passenger throughputs of the order of 30 - 40 passengers per minute, per gate, while performing an entrance/exit validation on magnetically encoded tickets.  

WESTERN RAIL CORRIDOR

The campaign for re-opening the Sligo-Limerick line under the name of the 'Western Rail Corridor' continues in the West of Ireland. The Minister for Transport Mr. Séamus Brennan, along with five other Government Ministers, visited five closed stations on Sligo-Claremorris-Tuam-Athenry line on 13 February. He was presented with a petition with 100,000 signatures calling for the line to be re-opened. The Minister said it was his intention to immediately assemble a high-powered working party to examine as a ‘matter of urgency’ which sections of the line might be opened on a phased basis.

Mr Brennan made no commitment to funding for the project. He said that while it would be a populist gesture to make an immediate announcement about the project, he had to be conscious that taxpayers' money was at stake.

The Minister said that the Tuam-Athenry-Galway section was likely first stage if the business case can be made. He said that the Strategic Rail Review commissioned by the Government had concluded that the line would not be viable. “I've declined that view. If they can make a good business and planning case, we will look at opening it in sections. The most viable part would be from Tuam to Galway because that is commuter country”.

A study published by West on Track estimated that Sligo-Limerick-(Cork) line could be re-opened for under €250m instead of the €570m estimated in the Strategic Rail Review and that there is significant potential for freight traffic on the route.