A senior figure behind MetroLink says it is “unhelpful” that the rail project has yet to secure planning permission, given the urgent need to attract international backers to develop the line.
Michael Flynn, MetroLink deputy programme director, was speaking to reporters ahead of a major event at The Helix in Dublin on Thursday. The event was planned to drum up market interest to build the 18.8km rail line, which is expected to cost in excess of €10 billion.
The history of the Metro North project, a similar proposed line that was scrapped in 2011, made large infrastructural investors “question whether Dublin and Ireland is serious about building MetroLink", Mr Flynn said.
This was compounded by the lack of a decision from An Coimisiún Pleanála – the planning commission – on the Railway Order application. The application was submitted three years ago and sought for the line to run from Swords in north Dublin to Charlemont in the south of the capital, serving Dublin Airport and the city.
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The MetroLink Market Engagement Event, which also heard from Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Tánaiste Simon Harris, was attended by close to 800 representatives of engineering and construction firms. The event was organised months ago, in anticipation of the planning commission giving the project the green light.
[ Consortium of five international companies to bid for MetroLink projectOpens in new window ]
However, despite indicating several months ago that it intended to issue its decision by the end of the summer, the commission has yet to decide whether to grant the Railway Order necessary for the project to go ahead.
Thursday’s event was, according to Mr Flynn, “an opportunity for us to announce to the national and international market that we are coming into the market to seek partners to build MetroLink”.
The project needed to attract “very large international contractors”, he said. Mr Flynn added: “There’s been a tremendous amount of consolidation amongst those companies. So there’s a very small pool of large international companies capable of doing this work.
“We are basically vying with the rest of the world to attract those big companies here to Dublin. And we’re trying to demonstrate to them that this project is viable . . . We’re trying to demonstrate that Dublin is the right place for them to choose and that we’re the right project for them.”
[ Dublin’s MetroLink: How much will it really cost?Opens in new window ]
It was a “seller’s market” he said. “We’re trying to demonstrate that Dublin is the right place for them to choose and that we’re the right project for them.”
Mr Flynn added that, in the eyes of these international organisations, the history of Metro North is a black mark against MetroLink.
“One of the things we find when you engage with these big international firms is that they all remind us they have spent an absolute fortune bidding on the Metro North project," he said. “They question whether Dublin and Ireland is serious about building MetroLink, because they know they have other options available to them on the global stage. And that is a real concern.”
The lack of planning permission ahead of the market engagement event was “unhelpful” he said. “It would be better [to have planning permission] because it is a further reinforcement while we engage with these people, because it is one of the questions they ask us.”
However, he was still confident the project could progress to procurement in the first quarter of next year, with construction beginning in 2027, which would allow services to begin in the mid-2030s.
Mr Martin said MetroLink was a “truly transformative investment for the entire country”, adding that Government had “clearly signalled” its intention to invest in the project. “Its tangible delivery will commence under this Government’s leadership,” the Taoiseach insisted.
He stated that the funding for the project is “now in place”, but conceded that the system for delivering critical infrastructure “needed to change . . . we’re not saying we need to cut corners, but we need to cut out unnecessary steps”.
