The National Licensing Authority at the Planning Administration has issued Israel's first permit to build a metro station: the underground structure of the Ariel Sharon Park station on Line M3 (station M3017, in section A.1 of national infrastructure plan TTL 103).
The permit covers digging out and removing some 300,000 cubic meters of soil, building underground retaining walls about 38 meters deep held by nine rows of ground anchors, and preparing the infrastructure for the tracks. The works are expected to take about 25 months. A site compound will include offices, a soil-drying area, a bentonite filtration unit and a water treatment unit.
Because the site lies about 71 meters from the Shfirim stream, special rules were set for night lighting and for restoring the landscape once works end, and an environmental appendix agreed with the Environmental Protection Ministry requires dust and air-quality monitoring. Environmental tests found no expected breach of noise limits. The process involved coordination with the Israel Electric Corporation, Mekorot, local authorities and government ministries.
Ron Rakach, head of the National Licensing Authority, said the permit marks a significant shift "from plans on paper" to engineering work on the ground. Shira Brand, acting chair of the National Infrastructure Committee, called it "a first and significant step" toward building the entire metro network.
The permit does not mean work starts right away: NTA must first complete the execution tenders and sign contractors. Even once the structure is finished, the station will not serve passengers until the whole line's infrastructure is in place – the target for metro operations is 2037. No permits have yet been issued for stations on the central section of Line M3, although design work on some of them is complete.
Photo: MathKnight / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0