Madam, – Frank McDonald writes lyrically about the Dart (“Follow this train of thought”, WeekendReview, July 4th) and he points out that the engineer in charge in the 1980s negotiated with residents associations and did not bulldoze it through.
For the last five years or more Irish Rail have been working on plans for a Dart underground interconnector that would tie in to the main Kildare line at Heuston station. As late as December last year Minister Dempsey was pledging that “despite the yawning budget deficit” this project would proceed.
However, in February a radically new plan was presented to the board of CIÉ and then announced publicly on April 20th. This plan included an entirely new 2.5km extension of the tunnel that would surface in an enormous construction site in the middle of the historic Inchicore Railway Estate, a residential estate of some 250 homes, that along with the the Inchicore railway works is a setpiece of nineteenth century vernacular architecture which is unique in the state. Irish Rail also announced on April 20th that they still intended to apply for a railway order as early as September.
That feels like bulldozing to me. – Yours, etc,