Luas Red Line
Tram · street-running light rail · 32 stops · Connolly – Saggart
About the Luas Red Line
The Luas Red Line is a tram. It runs on the street and on reserved track across the city from the docklands to Tallaght and Saggart; it is not a metro and none of it is underground.
The Red Line is the east–west half of the Luas, Dublin’s tram system. It opened on 26 September 2004 and runs through the city centre north of the River Liffey before turning south-west towards Tallaght, with a fork at Belgard for Citywest and Saggart. There are 32 stops. Trams run on the street, at street level, and the end-to-end run from The Point is scheduled at 50 minutes to Tallaght and 55 to Saggart. One quirk to know before you travel: Connolly is served in one direction only, so there is no direct tram from Connolly out to The Point.
Stops on the Luas Red Line
32 stops in running order, 6 of them an interchange.
The Point to Saggart
Main route, 29 stops
A ring on the dot marks a stop where you can change line, either on the spot or by a short walk to a separate station. The small name under each one is its official Irish name.
Timetable and frequency
| Day | First – last | Trams a day | Timetable date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mon–Thu | 05:28 – 01:17 | 804 | 2026-11-18 |
| Friday | 05:28 – 01:17 | 804 | 2026-11-20 |
| Saturday | 06:07 – 01:18 | 366 | 2026-11-21 |
| Sunday | 07:00 – 00:18 | 377 | 2026-11-22 |
| Bank holiday | 07:00 – 00:18 | 377 | 2026-10-26 |
| Whole route | Scheduled time |
|---|---|
| The Point – Tallaght | 50 min |
| The Point – Saggart | 55 min |
| Connolly – Tallaght | 43 min |
| Connolly – Saggart | 48 min |
| Tallaght – The Point | 51 min |
| Saggart – The Point | 56 min |
| Tallaght – Connolly | 44 min |
| Saggart – Connolly | 49 min |
First and last departure anywhere on the line, from the NTA’s published timetable for a representative week. Nothing on this line runs through the night.
How often trams run
| Time of day | Departures | Typical gap | Longest gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| Before 07:00 | 19 | every 4 min | 13 min |
| Morning peak 07:00–10:00 | 66 | every 3 min | 9 min |
| Midday 10:00–16:00 | 128 | every 3 min | 6 min |
| Evening peak 16:00–19:00 | 69 | every 3 min | 5 min |
| Evening 19:00–22:00 | 92 | every 3 min | 7 min |
| After 22:00 | 32 | every 3 min | 14 min |
Departures in one direction at Belgard, the busiest stop on the line, on a Monday to Thursday. Other stops are quieter; the branches are served by part of the service only.
Things to know before you travel
- Connolly is a one-way through stop and a terminus at the same time. Westbound trams from The Point call at Connolly between George’s Dock and Busaras; eastbound trams towards The Point run Abbey Street – Busaras – George’s Dock and do not call at Connolly. Trams that finish at Connolly arrive from the Tallaght/Saggart direction. So there is no direct tram from Connolly to The Point: change at Busaras.
- The line splits at Belgard: one branch to Tallaght (Cookstown, Hospital, Tallaght), one to Saggart (Fettercairn, Cheeverstown, Citywest Campus, Fortunestown, Saggart).
Where you can change
In Dublin a change between tram and train is a walk along the street: the Luas stop and the railway station are different places with different names.
| Stop | Other lines here | On foot to |
|---|---|---|
| Spencer Dock | — | Docklands (6 min walk) |
| Connolly | — | Dublin Connolly (2 min walk); Busáras (2 min walk) |
| Busáras | — | Dublin Connolly (4 min walk); Connolly (2 min walk) |
| Abbey Street | — | Marlborough (3 min walk); O'Connell - GPO (3 min walk); Westmoreland (4 min walk); Tara Street (4 min walk) |
| Museum | — | Dublin Heuston (12 min walk) |
| Heuston | — | Dublin Heuston (2 min walk) |
History
Construction began in March 2001 on the line from Tallaght to Connolly, with Ansaldo of Italy and MVM of Australia contracted to build the system and Transdev Ireland, then trading as Connex, to run it. The same contract covered the Sandyford to St Stephen's Green section of what became the Green Line, so the two lines were built at the same time. One piece of the original plan never happened: a section from St Stephen’s Green out to Dublin Airport was dropped before building began, and no tram or train has reached the airport since.
The line opened on 26 September 2004 and has been extended twice. The stretch from Connolly on to The Point, serving the rebuilt docklands, opened in 2009, and the fork from Belgard to Saggart followed in 2011. In December 2017 the Green Line extension crossed the Red Line either side of the Abbey Street stop, giving the two lines their first interchange. The most recent interruption came in 2025, when a fire on 18 August damaged the bridge at George’s Dock; trams towards The Point had to turn back at Connolly for three months, and the line was not fully reopened until 28 November 2025.
The service
This is the heaviest-worked line on the network: 804 tram trips on a Monday to Thursday, the first at 05:28 and the last at 01:17, with 366 on Saturday and 377 on Sunday. Weekday gaps at the busier stops are around three minutes for most of the day. Trams divide at Belgard, so the Tallaght and Saggart branches each get part of the service and the outer stops are correspondingly quieter. A handful of short workings skip Busáras or Fatima. Saturday trams begin at 06:07 and Sunday trams at 07:00, and the Sunday timetable is the one used on bank holidays. Nothing runs through the night; the last trams finish shortly after one in the morning.
The trams and trains
The Red Line is worked by Citadis trams, low-floor vehicles boarded directly from the platform at each stop. The depot is at Red Cow, out on the M50, and the control room for the whole Luas system — both lines — is on the same site. Because the trams share road space for much of the route, the line is also exposed to traffic in a way the railways are not, and journey times through the city centre are set as much by junctions as by distance.
Frequently asked questions
Connolly sits on a one-way loop. Trams coming from The Point call there between George’s Dock and Busáras, but trams heading out to The Point run Abbey Street, Busáras, George’s Dock and miss Connolly altogether. To go that way, change at Busáras.
At Belgard. One branch continues to Cookstown, Hospital and Tallaght; the other runs through Fettercairn, Cheeverstown, Citywest Campus and Fortunestown to Saggart. Each gets part of the service, so check the destination before boarding.
No. A branch from St Stephen’s Green to the airport was part of the original scheme but was dropped before construction started, and nothing has replaced it. There is no tram and no railway station at Dublin Airport; see our airport transport guide for what actually serves it.