The lives of residents living next to the Collins Avenue MetroLink station in Ballymun will be “nothing short of a nightmare” if the station is located at our Lady of Victories Church, An Bord Pleanála’s hearing on the €9.5 billion rail line has been told.
The seven-year metro construction period would risk the permanent closure of the church, put school children “in the middle of a building site” and have a “devastating impact” on residents’ lives, Paul Cusack of the Albert College and Ballymun Road North residents’ associations told the hearing.
Several local residents groups are appealing for the station to be moved 500m south into Albert College Park beside the DCU campus.
Having a station located at the entrance to DCU “that to us makes abundant sense and the church does not make sense”, Mr Cusack said.
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Ballymun Road carried 30,000 vehicles a day and lane closures on the road in front of the church to facilitate metro construction would cause “traffic chaos”, Mr Cusack said.
Construction also required the removal of 40 parking spaces in the vicinity of church and once the metro was operational these would be converted to bicycle spaces.
“Are we in Amsterdam here? Who is going to use 370 bike spaces?” Mr Cusack asked. “This is an unfair imposition because lot of people using these spaces are elderly and couldn’t get on a bike and cycle to church, nor are parents with young children going to. We believe that that is a ridiculous number of bicycle parking spaces. It’s tempting to say this is the green agenda gone slightly overboard.”
The “severe loss of parking” would particularly affect parents of school children and people accessing funeral and other church services he said, which would likely result in the congregation going elsewhere. There would also be an effect on school enrolment “who will want to send their children into a middle of a building site?”
He said moving the station to the south into Albert College Park would resolve these issues.
“We are asking a small cohort to walk 500m south rather than have this devastating impact on our lives.”
Dr Ronan Hallissey representing Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII) the State body with responsibility for Metrolink, said the “constrained” nature of the area made it difficult to identify a station location and “a lot of analysis” had been done establish a site that would serve the largest number of people but also provide the best interchange with other modes of transport.
The church site would attract 17,000 passengers “compared to 12000 predicted further south in the park” he said.
Representatives of Our Lady of Victories schools had been scheduled to address the hearing, however the board said on Tuesday it received an email confirming their support for the project and advising their concerns had been addressed.
The Griffith Avenue & District Residents Association has accused TII of “withholding information from the public” in relation to the construction of an emergency escape shaft in Albert College Park.
TII wants to build a tunnel escape shaft in the park due to the long distance between the Collins Avenue and Griffith Park stations.
The association’s chairwoman Una Caulfield said TII had, during the public consultation process, withheld the fact the shaft included a “large above ground structure” and belatedly held a separate “mini-consultation” on the shaft.
Emily Egan McGrath Senior Counsel for TII said there had been “extensive public consultation in respect of the proposed project” and “with regard to the allegations that are made of withholding information and concealment of information, those allegations are, with respect, without merit”.
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