By Aoife Lawless
The Luas Cross City is the name given to the new extensions planned for the Luas by the year 2017. The plans include extending the Luas line across the city from Stephens Green to Broomfield and are proposed to include the much anticipated ‘missing link’ between the red line and the green line.
In 2014, the Luas had been in operation for ten years. This June marks it’s eleventh year as a main feature of Dublin’s transport services. The Luas was first proposed in April 1994 and would not launch for a further ten years.
Construction began on the Luas in October 2000. Ten years on the Luas continues to expand across the city and has already added numerous new stops either side of it’s two lines, the Green Line and the Red Line. In 2008 the red line extended as far as the Point depot on Dublin’s northside.
In October 2010 The Green line extended by 11km with 9 new Stops to Brides Glen.In july 2011 The Red Line was extended by 4.5km with 5 new stops taking passengers as far as Saggart.
Future extensions plan to bridge the gap between the two current lines and join them both. The new lines are planned to extend from St Stephen’s green as far as Broomfield and boast a mere “21 minutes to travel the 5.6Km from St. Stephen’s Green to Broombridge”.