Transport Minister Eamon Ryan has said that he expects the Dublin MetroLink project to be given permission to begin construction this year.
Speaking to Miriam O’Callaghan on RTÉ Prime Time on Thursday, Ryan explained that he was anticipating that plans for the rail line would go to public hearing in the next two weeks.
“I expect it to get permission by this year, and then we start building,” the Green Party leader said.
The project, which is expected to cost €9.5 billion, would see a new railway with 16 stations run 18.8km from Swords to the south of Dublin city centre, with much of the line running underground. It is estimated that it would transport as many as 53 million passengers a year.
According to the MetroLink website, it will reduce the journey from Swords to the city centre to 25 minutes.
It is anticipated that the construction work will take somewhere from 6 to 8 years to complete.
MetroLink is categorised as a “mega-project” – a large-scale, complex venture that typically costs €1 billion or more; take many years to develop and build and involve multiple public and private stakeholders.
On the MetroLink website, Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) and the National Transport Authority say they are planning to ensure the project does not overrun on cost or time, as seen with the notorious National Children’s Hospital.
“We must rely on valid and reliable data from past international projects,” TII said.
“We will ensure that best practice is adopted for developing the final forecast cost ranges, rather than relying solely on conventional estimating methodologies.
“In October of 2020, Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) commenced a collaboration with Professor Bent Flyvbjerg and Dr Alexander Budzier.
“With the assistance of Oxford Global Projects and access to its database of previous similar project outcomes, we will put in place a comprehensive approach to forecasting project costs. This will ensure that Government decision makers have the best cost forecast information available to them. When final decisions about the project need to be made, all of this information will be included in the business case.”
Minister Eamon Ryan also said that the government was investing in public transport in a variety of other ways, not merely confined to the metro.
“We’re going to triple the level of the DART service in Dublin and introduce the Busconnects scheme, which we’ve already started,” he said.
“We’ve introduced five of the Busconnects corridors. And what’s happened? A dramatic jump in the number of passengers.”
He added: “…Across the country, there is a radical change coming. It is towards a different public transport-led, cycling and walking system. That is the way to go. It’s what every modern city is doing, it’s what we need to do most of all, and we will deliver it.”