Inspection to determine fate of tram connection
Two years after authorities shut down the stretch of the capital’s tram line between Kasomouli Street in the Athens neigborhood of Neos Kosmos and Syntagma due to safety concerns, the Urban Rail Transport Company (STASY) will on Wednesday launch an inspection to determine its fate.
The service was suspended in October 2018 amid concerns that the ground beneath the tracks, over the old Ilisos riverbed, was at risk of subsiding.
Now engineers have installed pressure sensors to measure and record load distribution along the tunnel under the tram line. Early indications are encouraging, suggesting that the line can be put back into operation without structural improvements.
Tram access to the center of Athens can only be fully restored by freeing the tracks along Vasilissis Olgas and Vasilissis Amelias avenues that were turned into bike lanes for the Grand Walk pedestrian network.
