The new Dublin Docklands railway station will bring an extra 20,000 passengers into the capital by train daily, the Minister for Transport said yesterday.
Iarnród Éireann began track and signalling infrastructure work on the station at Spencer Dock yesterday. It will apply to Dublin City Council for planning permission for the new station building next week and then put out to tender for the work.
Announcing the start of work on the new station, Martin Cullen said the project will not cause any disruption to existing services and open in 2007. It will remove 10,000 cars a day from Dublin streets, with services to Maynooth running every 15 minutes, and integrate with the Luas red line service.
The project will cost €28 million and is a key part of the Government's Transport 21 plan. It will deliver 5,000 additional passengers a day on opening, growing to 20,000 as services expand. Passengers will travel from Maynooth to the Docklands in 40 minutes, and from Clonsilla to the Docklands in 23 minutes.
Together with the city centre re-signalling project, due to be completed in 2009, the new service will increase city centre train capacity from 12 per hour per direction to 20 trains per hour.
The Minister said the Docklands station marks the beginning of the first phase of the Navan rail line development. When the work to reopen the old railway line between Clonsilla and Dunboyne is completed in 2009, all the services on that line will operate into the new city-centre station.
Navan rail campaigners, Meath on Track, welcomed the beginning of the project.
