The Railway Procurement Agency has said it will not consider changing its plans for the Metro North despite claims from Dublin businesses that its construction in O'Connell Street will cost up to 5,000 jobs.
The Dublin City Business Association has urged the agency to abandon plans for two underground stops in O'Connell Street in favour of one stop at Marlborough Street under the Department of Education buildings.
The authority said it is confident that the proposed route and selection of stops is correct and it intends to make an application to An Bord Pleanála in the coming months based on these plans.
The agency is proposing to locate one stop at O'Connell Bridge and another at Parnell Square.
The association's chief executive, Tom Coffey, said this will cause massive disruption to the street over a four-year period and could cost up to 5,000 jobs.
"When the Luas was constructed along Abbey Street through O'Connell Street some 50 to 60 jobs were lost.
"This is going to take four years and, because they are using cut and cover construction, basically digging down from the surface, O'Connell Street will be completely unusable."
Locating stations in O'Connell Street, as opposed to just digging underneath the street to create the tunnel for the metro, would mean that there will be construction at street level, which would mean buses would have to be removed from the street.
"This is a seriously primitive engineering option for the city's main street.
"We are in favour of the metro, and we are in favour of the route but all we want is for it to be done in such a fashion that is does not take out all of the road space, it doesn't take out all of the bus space and doesn't remove the footpath," Mr Coffey said.
The agency said it would not be revisiting its selection of station sites. The RPA had engaged in a series of meetings with the DCBA as well as other stakeholders and the public in drafting its plans for the metro, agency spokesman Tom Manning said.
Plans had been put in place to keep disruption to a minimum and there was no suggestion that O'Connell Street would be a building site for four years, he said.
"There is going to be a traffic management plan in place. It is our objective to ensure that the centre of the city keeps open for business. The full construction phase will take four years but no one section will be disrupted for that long." Traders would benefit from additional "foot-fall", Mr Manning said.
