"Globes" has learned that the safety approvals for opening the extension of the Jerusalem light rail Red Line were received last week. However, final approval from the Ministry of Transport has been delayed while a date is found for a ribbon cutting ceremony attended by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Minister of Transport Miri Regev.
Construction work on the ground was completed some time ago, and the trial runs that meant that the entire line had to be shut down earlier this month have also been successfully completed, and the safety approvals have been issued by the German company that awards such licenses. The Jerusalem transportation master plan team responsible for building the Jerusalem light rail had planned to open the extension yesterday (Tuesday) but the trains remain parked in the depot and passengers cannot use the extensions to Hadassah Ein Kerem in the south and Neve Yaakov in the north.
Work complete and the opening date postponed repeatedly
The Jerusalem light rail Red Line was opened to the public in 2011. The 14 kilometer line stretches from Pisgat Ze'ev in the north via Jaffa Road through the city center to Mount Herzl in the south. In 2009, the Jerusalem District Committee approved the extension of the line from Moshe Dayan Boulevard in Pisgat Zeev to the Neve Yaakov neighborhood with four new stations, and a few years later, the plan to extend the line from Mount Herzl to Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital was also approved, with the construction of eight additional stations. The project was delayed for many years due to a dispute between the state and the previous concessionaire, CityPass, until it was replaced by a concessionaire comprising Israeli company Shapir Engineering and Spain's CAF, which began construction work in 2021.
Since then, the opening dates for the line extensions have been postponed several times. July 2023 was the original opening date, and then a new date was agreed upon, which was also postponed due to war. The extension was then due to open at the end of 2024.
When the trial runs began earlier this month, the Ministry of Transport estimated that the line would open to passengers on February 21, last Friday. Indeed, the day before, the safety permits - those in Tel Aviv that delayed the operation of the train for many months - were received, and the Jerusalem train was ready to operate.
The Ministry of Transport demanded a few more completions and the opening date was revised to yesterday, but even then the tracks on which the work had been finally completed remained empty. The ministry wants to open the extensions in a ceremony attended by Regev and Netanyahu, so meanwhile passengers on the extensions must wait until the ribbon is cut.
The Ministry of Transport responded, "Contrary to your claim, the international controller's report from Germany on the operation of the light rail extensions only arrived Monday night. The report has approximately 200 pages and the regular process includes an in-depth analysis of the report and its conclusions, including verifying implementation of the report's conclusions in practice.
"As for the opening date, as is customary worldwide, in a new system, the operation is carried out on days when demand is low in order to ensure a safe and gradual start of activity. This has been the case in all operation events so far in Jerusalem, and therefore Friday was chosen as the operation date. There is no room for compromise on safety issues."
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on February 26, 2025.
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