Portal:Trains/Selected article/Week 40, 2013

Edinburgh Trams is a tram system under construction in Edinburgh, Scotland. The first phase of the project consists of a sixteen-station, 14 km link between York Place in New Town and Edinburgh Airport. Construction has been ongoing since 2008, but has been met with many delays and contractual disputes. Only half of the line proposed at the start of construction is being built. Originally, it was meant to stretch from the airport to Newhaven, but this was truncated due to a funding crisis. Another line serving the Southside has been postponed indefinitely. The system will be operated by Edinburgh Trams Limited, a company owned by the City of Edinburgh Council. The first part of the tram system was originally scheduled to open in February 2011. By March 2010, project delays had resulted in the prime contractor revising their estimated completion date to 2014, and by the end of 2010 only 28% of the infrastructure had been completed. The whole scheme was originally costed in 2003 at £375 million. A report issued in August 2011 estimated that the final cost of the truncated network would be over £1 billion, including £228 million of interest payments on a 30-year loan to cover the funding shortfall. , work continues on the tram scheme. The system is scheduled to open by May 2014.