A month ago the comfortable and modern trams were planned to open on tram line 7 around Midsummer.
The rails of the more than seven-kilometer-long tram line 7, which runs from the Central Market to the Dole shopping center, have been rebuilt and the overhead lines are ready. This was completed within the agreed deadline of mid-June. The project still has some minor work to be done at the substations. Work on the substations is expected to be completed by mid-July, but will not interfere with the operation of existing trams, said the municipal company Rīgas Satiksme.
However, the low-floor trams to and from Ķengarags to the center are not expected to open until the beginning of August. This is almost a month and a half later - in mid-May, it was promised to open around Midsummer.
A year ago, when the line was being rebuilt, Rigas Satiksme planned to run low-floor trams to Ķengarags already last Christmas.
Jānis Golubevs, Member of the Board of Rīgas Satiksme, said: "Maybe there was some hope of finishing the physical works a little sooner. If this thing had been done a little sooner, then there would have been a possibility to run the tram sooner. But at the moment, given that the works were actually carried out on site and in the substations right up to the end of the contract, the works are still going on today, so it has to be said that this real movement is, if you like, a bit delayed. Although, in fact, it has not been delayed, because the work is really taking place within the framework of the contract. So that we are 100% sure and there are no problems when we start the low-floor tram on line 7, we really want to be 100% sure that everything is in order."
Until August, trial runs will be carried out on low-floor trams without passengers at night between the center and Kengarags.
