Insights Belfast Rapid Transport

Atkins was commissioned by the Department for Infrastructure's Transport Project's Division on this £100m scheme to provide transportation services in relation Belfast Rapid Transit Phase 1 project. The system was developed to help to address the current and future transport needs in Belfast and support sustainable economic growth and regeneration within the city. The first phase connects East Belfast, West Belfast and Titanic Quarter via Belfast City Centre and was opened in September 2018 under the Guilder brand.

Atkins multi-disciplinary team provided a range of services to develop the design and specification as well as providing a tailored modelling package to assess the impacts of the bus priority measures and forecast future demand. Atkins also led preparation of an Outline Business Case which ensured a successful application for funding. When introduced the scheme bus priority measures encouraged a 40% shift to public transport and when Glider services became operational a further 30% boost was achieved on some corridor sections.

Atkins has since been appointed by DFL to prepare a further outline business case to support a city deals funding application to implement further Glider routes to the north and south of the city. Atkins has brought together a wide range of transport planning and engineering skills to provide a multi-disciplinary team to:

• Refine the transport models to add detail for the selected corridors
• Fine tune the preliminary designs of the extensive bus priority measures; include consideration of Covid impact sensitives;
• Prepare detailed options appraisal; including economic appraisals and development of an online business case, covering strategic, investment, management, delivery and commercial cases
• Provide specialist operational planning to integrate Glider with existing bus service
• Lead a stakeholder and public consultation exercise which is being undertaken virtually to reflect ongoing Covid conditions at the present time.