The new Maniatika, Piraeus and Municipal Theatre metro stations were inaugurated today by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
"The project we are delivering today is proof of the emphasis we place on infrastructure projects," the prime minister emphasised in his speech.
As he said, resources are being used from the European Union, the Recovery Fund, while he also focused on the cooperation of the Ministry of Culture with the Attica Metro to highlight the archaeological finds.
In a few months, he noted, "we will also inaugurate the Thessaloniki metro, where five stations, the main one being Venizelos, are also museums: both metro and ancient. And in Piraeus and Thessaloniki."
Addressing Antonis Samaras, Kyriakos Mitsotakis said that the project started during his prime ministership and noted that some were delivering works and some were presenting tarpaulins with painted tickets.
At 14:00 the routes start
At 2 in the afternoon they will be put into commercial operation to serve the passenger public.
With the new stations and the other three that were delivered two years ago (Agia Varvara, Korydallos and Nikaia), Piraeus will be connected to the airport in less than an hour from the estimated 80 minutes of today's route.
Accordingly, 20 minutes is the estimated time for Syntagma, contributing to the reduction of vehicle traffic and to the better and faster service of the passenger public.
The project will give a lot of breath, not only to the city centre, but also to the surrounding areas that are suffocated by traffic and served by the new extension such as Maniatika, Korydallos, Nikaia and Agia VarVara.
Attiko Metro estimates that the new extension will bring about 132,000 new passengers to the metro, reducing the number of vehicles by 23,000 per day and correspondingly reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 120 tons per day.
With the delivery of the project, Piraeus turns into an important transport hub, in which two metro lines (Lines 1 and 3) are synchronised, the extension of the tram to Piraeus.
However, in order for the metro stations to be completed, there were many obstacles, technical difficulties and contingencies (financial crisis, capital controls) that often derailed the project schedule and increased the cost.
The tip of the iceberg was the change in location of the Piraeus station which was built literally under the sea and its movement by 7.5 meters from the original position due to the discovery of an underground river!
The most recent delay in the delivery of the last three stations was attributed to radio coverage problems inside the tunnels and malfunctions in the supply of the telecommunications system that postponed the completion of the project by a few months.
With the commercial operation of the three new stations on Tuesday, the redesign of bus lines in the wider area of Piraeus will come into effect, with the aim of interoperability of the road transport network with the new stations of line 3 of the metro.
Every 36 minutes to the airport
With the extension of the metro network by 3.2 kilometres, line 3 "Municipal Theatre - Dukissis Placentias - Airport" now has 27 stations.
The frequency of the routes in the section Municipal theatre - Doukissis Placentias during peak hours (07.30-11.00 & 13:30 - 17:30) remains at 4' and at night hours (22:00 - 00:20) it is reduced to 9' out of 10'.
In the Airport - Municipal theatre section, the frequency is set at 36'. The first route from the Municipal Theatre and Dukissis Placentia stations will start at 05:30.
First services at 05:30 will start from Aigaleo and Monastiraki stations in the direction of Dukissis Plakentias and from the National Defence station in the direction of Municipal Theatre.
The last route (Monday – Thursday & Sunday) from the Municipal Theater will be at 23:59 and from Dukissis Placentias at 00:03.
Friday and Saturday, when the extension of operating hours applies, the last trains will depart at 01:06 from the Municipal Theatre and at 01:10 from Dukissis Placentias.
Last trains from Syntagma station in all directions will depart at 00:23 (Monday – Thursday & Sunday) and at 01:30 (Friday and Saturday).
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