Station near the ‘main’ hospital
A new railway stop is set to be built in Riga. It will be located in Agenskalns near the Pauls Stradiņš Clinical University Hospital. The stop will be on an electrified line that will allow travel to both Jūrmala and Bolderāja. The hospital provides over 700,000 services annually to residents from all over Latvia. However, there is no data on how many patients and hospital staff could benefit from it. It is also currently unknown how much the stop will cost.
As reported by Latvian Radio this morning, the new railway stop is planned to be built directly opposite the Stradiņš Hospital next to the street where cars are parked, likely belonging to patients or hospital workers. The hospital has chosen a location closer to Ventspils Street, where there is currently a pedestrian crossing. The nearest railway stop towards Jūrmala is Zasulauks, which is about a 10-15 minute walk away, while the nearest stop towards the city center is Torņakalns, located at least a few kilometers away. The potential stop would be situated on a fairly straight section of track, which is an important factor for establishing a new stop.
Several years ago, the Rail Baltica project included plans to build and reconstruct 10 stops in the area between the airport, central train station, and Daugavkrasta. This included a new stop “Agenskalns/Stradiņš.” However, there is no data on how many passengers would use it. Latvian Radio found this out from the Road Transport Directorate, which simultaneously emphasized that the new stop has high potential.
Seeing that the Rail Baltica project is not progressing, “Latvijas dzelzceļš” has potentially included the new stop in the modernization project of the Jūrmala line.
“At the end of last year, we received procurement proposals. We see that the volumes of the two cheapest proposals include, among other things, the construction of the Agenskalns [stop]. Accordingly, from the project budget, we can confidently say that we will build the Agenskalns station as part of this project.
The project implementation deadline is 2029, when this station should be completed. If everything goes as planned, our goal is to make a final decision on this procurement in March.
Then we can conclude the contract for the execution of these works at the moment when funding becomes available, that is, a contract with the Central Finance and Contracting Agency for the allocation of funding for this project is signed. And if everything goes successfully, May is the month when we both sign the funding contract and the contract for the execution of these works, and the design work will begin,” explained Agris Melne, the project management director of the enterprise, in an interview with Latvian Radio.