Discontinued in November 2018 for the benefit of boulevard Béranger, the hypothesis of a passage of the second tram line via boulevard Jean Royer is now being relaunched. The 22 mayors of the Metropolis of Tours voted unanimously, this Monday evening, to request additional studies on this artery which makes the junction between Sanitas and rue Giraudeau.
Exit therefore, for good, the boulevard Béranger to connect the two hospitals – Trousseau and Bretonneau – with an extension to La Riche. The mayor of Tours, Emmanuel Denis, opposed it because of poor root studies on the plane trees in the mall.
The only alternative to have a complete line
During a press briefing organized alongside the mayors of Tours, La Riche and Chambray-lès-Tours, the president of the Métropole, Frédéric Augis, estimated that boulevard Jean Royer was today “the only alternative to have a complete line”and not a half-line between Tours station and the Trousseau hospital, which would have deprived the community of funding from the State, the European Investment Bank and the Banque des Territoires, with a rather attractive rate of 0.6% over 50 years.
The decision is firm and final. It will be presented in committee then submitted to the vote of the metropolitan council Monday, June 28. Then, the Touraine mobility union (SMT) will be able to launch additional studies, in the order of 2 million eurosand sign the loan.
All assure it, it is not four years wasted. Because the future section will be based on the public consultation of 2017. And thehe constraints pointed out at the time on boulevard Jean Royersuch as garage exits or dozens of intersections, are less important than those of Béranger. “We had the trees on boulevard Jean Royer appraised and it turns out that they are not remarkable treesexplains Emmanuel Denis. So there is no obstruction to remove these trees. It has nothing to do with the Béranger email.”
A delayed delivery
The calendar remains rather vague. One thing is certain, the delivery initially scheduled for the second half of 2025 will be delayed. And the bill will continue to rise. The second tram line is estimated today at 570 million euros 30 of which have already been spent on studies, in particular those for Boulevard Béranger.
“The important thing was to launch the projectbelieves Wilfried Schwartz, the mayor of La Riche. Because otherwise, we would have lost 30 million, and we would have deprived thousands of people of the tramway. This second line is potentially 40,000 passengers per day. Without it, we would be a metropolis that is dropping out.” And Frédéric Augis to go one better. “We had to move forward so that we could also imagine the third line between Saint-Cyr-sur-Loire and Saint-Pierre-des-Corps”.