The Minister for Public Enterprise, Mrs O'Rourke, has announced the establishment of a light rail "advisory/action group" to oversee the planning and implementation of the expanded Luas system for Dublin, writes Frank McDonald, Environment Correspondent.
In a statement last night, she said the Government had given her the go-ahead to establish this "small but dynamic group" as evidence of its determination to ensure that Luas was put in place "as quickly as possible". Its members, to be announced shortly, would include the Luas project director, Mr Donal Mangan.
She said work on the Tallaght-Abbey Street line should start in spring 2000, with the Sandyford-St Stephen's Green line beginning that autumn. Construction was expected to take three years in each case. No timetable had been set for the underground section between St Stephen's Green and Broadstone.
Her statement did say, however, that CIE would begin public consultations this autumn on the surface section of the proposed Luas line from Broadstone to Ballymun and Dublin Airport, followed by consultancy studies of the underground section and the drilling of trial bore holes along the route in the summer of 1999.