The East End tram extension will finally open to passengers on Saturday October 13
PASSENGER services have finally begun on the East End tram extension.
PASSENGER services on the North Terrace tram extension have finally begun.
More than a year since major construction work started on the 1km extension, commuters will finally be able to catch a tram along North Tce to the East End after months of delays and millions of dollars in cost blowouts.
As revealed exclusively by The Advertiser today, the first tram along the new route left the Entertainment Centre just after 7am and arrived at the Botanic Gardens stop at 7.20am.
From now on, every second tram will run along North Tce to the East End.
The tram will go to the Festival Centre only on weekends.
Transport Minister Stephan Knoll said commuters would be relieved the service was finally operational.
“This has been a long time coming and I think South Australians will thoroughly enjoy the new service,” he said. “I’d like to thank South Australians, particularly our East End traders, for their patience over the last 12 or so months.
“Hopefully in the coming weeks and months, they reap the benefits of this project as we make it easier for people to travel to and enjoy everything our city’s East End has to offer.”
The start of passenger services on the extension comes after the project was marred by numerous missed deadlines spanning two State Governments and a blowout in costs to as much as $124 million.
Mr Knoll had labelled July 29 as a start date that was “set in stone” before a signalling fault was discovered – dating back to January – and forced the Transport Department to fly in an expert from Germany to pinpoint it and fix it.
Since the fault was identified and fixed in August, the department has been stress-testing the line constantly to make sure it is safe in light of the problems that besieged the project.
Mr Knoll last month said the State Government would work to minimise the cost to taxpayers as a result of the blowouts through a claims-variation process with the contractors of the project.
The tram extension was originally due to be completed in March, with the then Labor State Government pumping in an additional $10 million to speed up the works.
But it missed that deadline and subsequent deadlines in April, May and in July.
Now that the extension on North Tce is operational for passengers, the State Government will have to make a decision on whether it follows through with its pre-election promise of a $37 million right-hand turn from King William St on to North Tce.
Mr Knoll has received an engineering report regarding the proposed turn.
Last week, The Advertiser reported on how government documents, released under a Freedom of Information request by Labor, revealed that constructing the turn would be a complicated challenge requiring compromise because it is “already an extremely complex piece of rail geometry”.
The State Government will also conduct a review of the problem-plagued project to find out went wrong.