First test for new metro line
A test run run on the metro’s new western extension was conducted successfully yesterday, on a stretch that will be used by an estimated 80,000 commuters every day. The line will be opened to the public in the first 10 days of May and carry passengers from Syntagma to Aegaleo in just seven minutes. Construction firms have blamed a two-year delay in the project on the large number of archaeological finds they came across while digging, along with other «technical difficulties.» The 4.3-kilometer extension involves the addition of three new stations, Kerameikos, Eleona and Aegaleo, to the metro’s Line 3 which currently ends at Monastiraki station. The cost of the new extension will total 553 million euros, or about 128.5 million euros per kilometer. According to the Public Works Ministry, the line will be further extended to Haidari by the end of 2008.
