LAST UPDATE | 14 Apr

THE ESTIMATED NUMBER of yearly passengers on the proposed Luas Cork is 30 million fewer than the figure provided in a previous transport strategy.

In February 2020, the 2040 Transport Strategy for the Cork Metropolitan Area was published by the National Transport Authority (NTA).

This report estimated that the Luas Cork would come in at a cost of around €1 billion and carry 46 million passengers per year – or 4,600 per direction per hour at peak times.

The Luas Cork estimates provided in the Cork Metropolitan Area 2040 Transport Strategy

However, the emerging preferred route published today is a considerable downgrade on these passenger figures.

Rather than a forecast of 46 million passengers per year, this has been reduced to 16 million.

And the figure of 4,600 passengers per hour per direction at peak times – with trams running every five minutes – has been cut to 2,300 passengers, with trams running every six minutes instead.

For comparison, current Luas Green Line services in Dublin can carry around 9,000 passengers per direction per hour and there are plans to increase this.

The 2040 Transport Strategy had also included an even more ambitious target of running trams every two minutes, which would have allowed for 11,400 passengers at peak hours.

The updated figures included in today's preferred route Luas Cork Luas Cork

Transport Minister Darragh O’Brien last month estimated that Luas Cork could cost between €2 billion and €3 billion and today remarked that it’s “very difficult to estimate” how much it will cost.

Feljin Jose is the Green Party’s transport spokesperson.

He said the preferred route “is not future-proofed and Cork deserves better”.

Speaking to The Journal, he voiced concern that the preferred route published today is “significantly lower than what we were talking about in the strategy underpinning this”.

He added that there is “very little priority given to trams” in the preferred route, with “shared running on streets with cars”.

“It’s not like the Luas Green line where it has its own separate path and there’s nobody else in it,” said Jose.

“Obviously, the Luas shares space in Dublin city centre, but the priority for the Luas isn’t there in the Cork plan.

“If you have it sharing space with more cars and sharing the tram tracks, it’s going to slow the tram down.”

Jose also expressed concern about the journey time.

Luas Cork would deliver passenger from Ballincollig to the City Centre in 35 minutes, but Jose noted that there is a bus service that can do this in 20 minutes.

The 2040 Transport Strategy meanwhile estimated that this journey would take 27 minutes.

Ciarán Meers heads the Cork Commuter Coalition, which advocates for public transport in Cork City and the surrounding region.

While he said he was “very happy that this is finally at this stage and progressing”, he added that there are issues with the preferred route.

He told The Journal that the four-stop loop in Ballincollig is “really limiting” and noted that the tram line was initially projected to go through the Mahon Greenway.

The proposed Ballincollig route Luas Cork Luas Cork

“Instead, it’s taking a twisty route through suburbs which is going to involve a lot of turns, slower speeds and will bring down capacity.”

Meers also voiced concern that Luas Cork will have a lower capacity than the Green line of the Luas.

“Cork is one of the fastest growing cities in Ireland, so we really do need this capacity to fuel the growth of the city.”

The National Planning Framework 2040 stated that Cork will become the fastest-growing city region in Ireland with a projected 50% to 60% increase of its population in the period up to 2040.

Initial thoughts :
- Build build build!
- The area in Ballincollig is quite truncated : instead of a loop, it should be going on a dual track all the way out to Dell/EMC and a P&R there
- It should also be using the greenway track as originally intended… https://t.co/PEF6MkJcFn

— Cork Commuter Coalition (@CorkCommuter) April 14, 2025

He noted a recent study by satnav company TomTom which deemed Cork to be the 38^th most congested city in the world – not as bad as Dublin (which ranked 10^th) but worse than London and Rome.

“It’s absolutely insane how congested Cork is, and we need to demand better to ensure that Cork isn’t locked into the same thing for decades and decades.”

Meers also noted that the preferred route won’t extend to western Ballincollig but said he was “hopeful” that this could be “ironed out in the public consultation.”

In a statement to The Journal, a spokesperson for Luas Cork remarked that the transport strategy published in 2020 was “based on an assumption that the entire transport network was in place and that land use around transit was optimised”.

In this scenario, the forecast was that Luas Cork would carry 46 million passengers per year in 2040.

The spokesperson added that “conservative assumptions” have been made for the preferred route published today and that its modelling year is 2035.

Meanwhile, the spokesperson said the 2020 transport strategy assumed that longer trams with a capacity of 380 passengers would be used.

The trams associated with the preferred route published today are around ten metres smaller in length and have a passenger capacity of 300.

The spokesperson said Luas Cork will be able to increase capacity “by buying additional trams and adding more frequent services when the demand will require it”.

The spokesperson also noted that the Luas in Dublin exceeded all modelling expectations and that the Luas Cork modelling could be refined.