the runway and split westward near Kirkliston towards Glasgow and Stirling and eastward to Fife and the North, and would require the construction of a new subsurface railway station in front of the terminal building. A parliamentary bill was submitted to the Scottish Parliament which needed to be considered and approved before construction could take place. The Bill received Royal Assent on 19 April 2007. Initial estimates suggested that the scheme would have cost around £500m. Following the Scottish Parliament election of 2007, the new SNP minority administration planned to scrap EARL as a manifesto commitment. Following a vote in the Scottish Parliament on 27 June 2007, the EARL project was cancelled. However, as part of the Edinburgh to Glasgow Improvement Programme, Edinburgh Gateway station in Gogar was opened in 2016 on the Fife line as an inter-change station with Edinburgh Trams. Forth hovercraft Proposals were put forward by Fife Council in 2004 for a passenger ferry service to operate between Kirkcaldy and Leith. The plans envisaged a half-hourly service across the Firth of Forth, operational by 2008, with two vessels capable of carrying up to 150 passengers. An experimental hovercraft service ran in summer 2007 between Kirkcaldy and Seafield, operated by Stagecoach Group. Journey times were 18 minutes and the service was used by around 32,000 passengers. Cross-Forth proposals were revived in 2009 when Edinburgh Council began to examine the possibility of beginning either a ferry service between Burntisland and Granton, or the revival of the hovercraft service. In January 2010, Stagecoach set up a joint venture with hovercraft makers the Bland Group to run a hovercraft service, and secured funding of around £14 million. Subject to funding Edinburgh and Fife councils, the companies hoped to construct a dedicated hovercraft terminal near the promenade at Portobello and begin passenger operation by 2012. They estimated 870,000 people would use the hovercraft service each year, and sailings would connect with local bus services into Edinburgh and around Fife. In 2017, The City of Edinburgh Council refused planning permission to construct a hovercraft terminal at Portobello. High-speed rail Community and business leaders in Edinburgh have voiced support for the construction of a high-speed rail link between Glasgow and Edinburgh to reduce current journey times between Scotland's two main cities. Currently Abellio ScotRail operate a shuttle service, every 15 minutes between 7am and 7pm, between the two cities on the Glasgow to Edinburgh