Built for €6m in 2009 but never opened, Dublin’s ‘ghost’ station to get €3.8m refit

A west Dublin train station that has been dormant since its construction at a cost of more than €6 million 14 years ago will open later this year, Irish Rail has confirmed.

The Kishoge station, on the Kildare line between Clondalkin and Adamstown, was completed in 2009 and was intended to serve a new community at Clonburris, planned as the next new west Dublin suburb after Adamstown.

The creation of a high density “eco-district” of up to 15,000 homes at Clonburris was proposed by South Dublin County Council in the mid-2000s and approved by An Bord Pleanála in 2008, with the new Kishoge station seen as crucial to the suburb’s sustainable development.

Construction of the station was well under way by the time the Clonburris Strategic Development Zone (SDZ) – a fast-track planning scheme that allows the council to grant planning permission than cannot be appealed to An Bord Pleanála – was approved by the board in 2008.

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It was intended the station would be brought into operation to coincide with the phased completion of the new apartment blocks. However, while the station was finished in 2009, no construction had started on the residential scheme ahead of the property crash.

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As the State emerged from the recession, the council decided to revise its plans for Clonburris, which remained as a large, undeveloped landbank of 265 hectares to the north and south of the rail line. A more modest, lower-density SDZ scheme of just over 8,400 homes was prepared by the council and approved by the board in 2019.

The first homes under the new scheme - almost 400 social, affordable purchase and cost-rental homes that will be developed by the council, and 569 homes that will be built by Cairn homes, the largest private landowner in Clonburris - were approved last year, with construction due to start early this year.

Irish Rail said it would open the Kishoge station in December, but a spokesman said, “extensive works” were needed to refurbish and upgrade the station. These would cost about €3.8 million, he said, more than half the original €6.35 million cost of the station.

“There are extensive works needed to bring the station into service, including meeting present-day accessibility and systems requirements which are above and beyond the original requirements, replacement and repairs associated with wear and tear, vandalism and other degradation over time, as well as applying new materials which experience from other stations has shown us to be better-suited to a commuter station environment,” he said.

The work will include lift replacement, renewal or replacement of all mechanical, electrical fire and telecoms cables and equipment, internal and external wall works, replacement of flooring areas, damaged ramps and tactile tiling, paths and paving repairs, and the installation of up-to-date signage and station furniture.

The work is scheduled to begin in March and be completed by November, ahead of the opening of the station in December.