Tel Aviv's Yehuda Halevi Street reopened to traffic Friday in both directions after a five year closure, NTA Metropolitan Mass Transit System Ltd. announced. The stretch of Yehuda Halevi Street between Tiomkin Street and Allenby Street has been closed to allow work on the Tel Aviv light rail Red Line's Ofra Haza underground station at the corner of Allenby Street. Last month the Tel Aviv light rail was renamed DanKal.
The Tel Aviv light rail Red Line will run 24 kilometers connecting five cities Petah Tikva, Bnai Brak, Ramat Gan, Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and Bat Yam. The line will subsequently be extended to Rishon Lezion's Moshe Dayan station. Half the line will be underground. There will be 34 stations including 10 stations underground.
Construction of the line began in 2013 and was due to end in 2019. But following budgetary problems and technical difficulties, the opening date was put back until the end of 2021 and it is not clear if that deadline will be met.
The Ofra Haza - Allenby station will be the southernmost of the 10 underground stations on the Red Line and will be 22 meters beneath the surface. 36,000 passengers are forecast to use the station every day and 10 million passengers annually.
