The Helsinki City Board has unanimously approved the project plan for the Helsinki metropolitan area light rail line, so called Raide-Jokeri (Rail Jokeri), to run east to west from eastern Helsinki to Espoo. The decision on the plan proposal will be made by the City Council, which will vote on the proposal at its meeting on 15 June. Raide-Jokeri would run from Itäkeskus via Oulunkylä, Huopalahti and Leppävaara to Keilaniemi in Espoo, replacing the current bus line 550, which follows the same route.
The total length of the line would be 25 km, 16 km of which would run in Helsinki and 9 km in Espoo, and will run on two tracks, mainly on exclusive lanes separated from other traffic. The light rail line would have 33 pairs of stops, making the average distance between stops 800 metres. Construction is scheduled to begin next year, to allow the service to start in 2021.
According to the project plan, the track construction cost would be EUR 275 million, of which the Finnish Government supports the project with EUR 84 million, representing 30 percent of the construction cost. Helsinki’s share of the construction cost would be about EUR 124 million and that of Espoo EUR 66.6 million. Additional costs to Helsinki would be incurred by the fleet, that is, the rail cars, which would cost EUR 95 million, and by the depots, which would cost EUR 49.5 million.
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