Work on the Tel Aviv light rail in the Greater Tel Aviv area will begin next Sunday. A long list of organizations, including the company building the railway, Israel Police, and the public transportation companies, are preparing to deal with the challenge.
On Sunday, NTA Metropolitan Mass Transit System will begin its preparations for traffic changes to take place on Monday around Allenby St. in central Tel Aviv. The changes are expected to include Mikve Israel, Bezalel Yafe, Yavne, Shadal, and Ramchal Sts. Yehuda Halevy St. will be closed to traffic. Traffic will be diverted to Mikve Israel St., on which the direction of traffic will be changed from easterly to westerly. Bezalel Yafe St. will be connected to Harakevet St., and the entry to and exit from Shadal and Yavne Sts. will be solely from Rothschild Blvd.
Two weeks later, on August 16, Maariv Junction will be closed in preparation for the construction of the Carlebach railway station. The legendary Maariv bridge will be demolished, to be replaced by an underpass at the junction. While the work is taking place, traffic on Begin Rd. and Carlebach, Hamasger, Lincoln, Hataasiya, Hamelacha, Yitzhak Sadeh, and Riva Sts. will be diverted. Begin Rd. will be closed to traffic around Carlebach Junction.
Public transportation will be adapted to the planned new traffic arrangements as a result of the work, and will be diverted to Hamasger and Hahashmonaim Sts., and special lanes will be allotted to it. The direction of traffic on Hataasiya and Hamelacha Sts. will be changed. Construction of the Yehudit railway station will get underway in the next 10 days, but there will be no changes in traffic arrangements in this case.
Work will begin on the Abba Hillel Silver railway station in the last week of August, on the Bialik railway station in early September, and on the Arlosorov and Shaul Hamelech railway stations in October. Work on the eastern part of the line, which includes the Aharonovitch and Ben Gurion railway stations, will begin only in December.
Cooperation with Waze
Concurrently with the introduction of new traffic arrangements in the Allenby St. area on Sunday, NTA will set up an onsite command room in the area for its representatives and representatives of the installation contractors, from which the work will be managed. Another onsite command room will be set up near the Carlebach railway station, and a "situation room" will be established on Sunday in the Tel Aviv municipality, with representatives of all the relevant parties, including NTA, Israel Police, the Ministry of Transport, the Tel Aviv Municipality, and even Waze.
Representatives of all the relevant cities will participate in the situation room: Givatayim, Ramat Gan, Bnei Brak, Bat Yam, and Petah Tikva. Information will reach the situation room from policemen in the field, cameras, situation rooms of Netivei Israel National Transport Infrastructure Company and Ayalon Highways, Tel Aviv municipality traffic lights control, aerial observation, patrolmen, and local authorities. Situation assessments will be made continually, depending up events in the area.
In preparation for the beginning of construction, Israel Police asked for 240 more positions for the project, but the Ministries of Finance and Transport agreed to only 168 positions. The police expect to augment law enforcement against private vehicle owners using lanes reserved for public transportation. In the coming weeks, dozens of cameras will be stationed in key traffic lanes, including Namir Rd. and Rokach, Carlebach, and Hamasger Sts. Only a few days ago, the Knesset Economic Affairs Committee approved a bill initiated by Minister of Transport Yisrael Katz that will allow local authorities inspectors, in addition to policemen, to write traffic tickets and fines for drivers caught on film driving in a public transportation lane. The fine for illegally driving in a public transportation lane is currently NIS 250, but the Ministry intends to raise it to NIS 750.
The Egged Israel Transport Cooperative Society Ltd., Dan Public Transportation Co. Ltd., and Metropolitan bus companies are preparing for the dramatic traffic changes. The companies assert that as soon as the work starts, all passengers can get up-to-date information on the companies' websites. Egged said that as far as it was concerned, no dramatic changes were expected in the traffic maps in the coming days, but "changes in timetables due to expected traffic jams are possible."
Dan, on the other hand, claims that the company has been meeting for months with professionals from the Ministry of Transport and NTA in order to "find the right formula that will minimize public suffering." The company says that it is getting 20,000 queries about what will happen starting on Sunday, compared with 13,000 queries on a normal day.
Dan is preparing to augment its regular buses and add new bus lines, including lines 20 and 21, which will stop at the Savidor Central, Hashalom, and Hahagana railway stations, and reach the main business centers.
In addition, Dan bus no. 189 will become a bus rapid transit system, which will make increasing its capacity possible. The company is putting old buses back into service, and will also order new buses. Dan says that starting in August, passengers will be allowed to enter buses through the rear doors, which will reduce travel time.
Metropolitan said that it will introduce only one new line, no. 147, on Yehuda Halevy St. in Tel Aviv.
14 more trains
During the construction work, Israel Railways is expect to add 14 trains at peak hours: an addition of four trains in each direction from 6:00 AM to 9:00 AM and three trains in each direction in the afternoon from 3:00 PM to 7:00 PM.
This addition is designed to increase the passenger capacity by 3,500 places daily. The Tel Aviv municipality claims that it is preparing for the project in a variety of ways, among other things through park and ride parking lots. These parking lots, which will be opened in Modiin, Gan Yehoshua in Petah Tikva, and Tel Baruch, are expected to contain a total of 3,500 parking spaces. The vehicle owner pays NIS 15 a day, and can travel free of charge on the shuttle service leaving the parking lots every five minutes to the main business areas.
The Tel Aviv municipality added, "Due to the expected increase in the use of various types of two-wheel vehicles, the Tel-O-Fun bicycle sharing service is preparing a complex operation to move its stations according to the progress in the work, and to deploy additional stations in high-demand areas, including cities bordering us, such as Ramat Gan and Givatayim, so that more users can use the service instead of their private vehicles."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on July 30, 2015
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