Work is to begin on improvements to the Passage Railway Greenway Improvement Scheme next week.
Site clearance works will begin on the section from the N40 near Mahon Point to the Marina on Monday, February 22 so they can be completed in advance of the bird nesting season.
The Passage Railway Greenway Improvement Scheme is aimed at providing a high quality, attractive transportation and recreational route while creating and supporting an environmental living corridor.
The project will :
- Widen the greenway from the existing 3m to 5m in width.
- Provide new and improved access points
- Provide CCTV facilities and environmentally sensitive public lighting along the full extent of the greenway
- Reinstate the Blackrock Road railway footbridge, utilising the existing historic abutments, access ramps and disused railway platforms
- Repair and clean the existing bridges, historical structures and features along the route
- Undertake soft landscaping works including tree, shrub and wildflower planting with native pollinator friendly species.
- Install bee, bird and bat boxes to improve the greenways biodiversity
- Install water drinking points and other measures.
The site clearance work will include the removal of brush and trees.
A total of 46 trees will need to be removed, a limited number of which are already dead or unsafe. However, the project team will replace these trees with 65 semi mature trees and over 2,000 saplings.
All of the new trees will be native Irish species, as advised by the project’s environmental advisors.
The greenway will be kept open, to the greatest possible extent, throughout the works however it will be necessary to close sections on a rolling basis for the safety of both users and workers.
Traffic management plans will be established to facilitate the safe movement of construction traffic. Information and diversion signage will be in place for pedestrians and cyclists.
It’s expected that this phase of the works will take approximately two weeks.
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