Official figures suggest around $100bn may be spent by the end of this decade laying over 6,000km (3,750 miles) of track for both national lines and a route linking all the states in the Gulf Co-operation Council: Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and Bahrain.
The governments face big technical challenges, such as making six national rail systems compatible and building on the shifting sands of remote deserts.
But success could have far-reaching effects on economies in the region, cutting their dependence on expensive road and air travel, boosting trade and even bringing the GCC closer together politically.
Railway will open up all sorts of trading relationships that probably otherwise would not have existed
“It will undoubtedly transform the economies as any major piece of railway does,” said Keith Hampson, director of global rail transit at Aecom, a US-based transport planning firm. “It opens up all sorts of trading relationships that probably otherwise would not have existed.”
Rail transport has been neglected in the Gulf since then; trade depends heavily on trucks running along desert highways. Currently, the only major rail systems operating in the GCC are a 60-year old freight and passenger link between Riyadh and the port of Dammam in Saudi Arabia, and Dubai’s metro.
But that is set to change dramatically as growing populations and countries’ desire to diversify their economies away from oil exports cause them to pour money into railway construction.
Saudi Arabia is building a 2,750km line from Riyadh to its northern border with Jordan, aiming to complete it in 2014
Saudi Arabia is building a 2,750km line from Riyadh to its northern border with Jordan, aiming to complete it in 2014. About 2,260km of additional lines are planned in Saudi Arabia, including metro systems and high-speed train projects.
In the UAE, Etihad Rail has started building a link that is to transport granulated sulphur from desert gas fields to the southern port of Ruwais after it is finished in 2014.
The Gulf states are expected to prepare a detailed engineering design for the $15bn joint line by end-2013 or mid-2014
The national networks are to be connected to a joint GCC line that would run from Kuwait along the Gulf coast to Muscat in Oman. The Gulf states are expected to prepare a detailed engineering design for the $15bn joint line by end-2013 or mid-2014, an official at the GCC’s Secretariat General said.
“Hopefully by the beginning of 2018, the railway will start operating,” said Ibrahim al-Sabti, director of the transportation department at the Riyadh-based secretariat.
The network could help develop remote desert and mountain areas of the GCC.
Trade within the GCC and its re-exports to other countries are expected to get a boost. Intra-GCC trade rose from $19.8bn in 2003 to $65.4bn in 2010, still only a tiny fraction of last year’s total GCC trade value of $1.3tn.
Ports in the GCC are making plans to expand partly on the assumption that they will be connected to the railway
Ports in the GCC are making plans to expand partly on the assumption that they will be connected to the railway. One of them is the port of Salalah in the far south of Oman, near the border with Yemen.
In May this year, Oman revealed plans to more than double port cargo handling capacity at Salalah by 2014, when it also aims to finish building a cargo terminal at the city’s airport.
In 2009, a GCC feasibility study forecast the joint GCC rail line would open in 2016, carrying 29mn tons of freight out of 61mn transported by all means in the region. Annual passenger traffic was projected at 4mn people in 2016-2020, with passenger revenue of $240mn in 2016 rising to $600mn in 2045.
Salalah will become a major link between the GCC and the rest of the world. Because the port lies outside the Strait of Hormuz, it will reduce the GCC’s vulnerability to threats by Iran to close that key shipping route.
Despite the huge cost of the rail network, high oil prices and large state budget surpluses in the Gulf mean financial considerations look unlikely to block the project, at least in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar.
Scores of international firms, from US engineering giant Bechtel to South Korea’s SK Engineering & Construction, are hunting aggressively for railway business in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar
Scores of international firms, from US engineering giant Bechtel to South Korea’s SK Engineering & Construction, are hunting aggressively for railway business in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar. The weakness of government finances in many other parts of the world makes the Gulf rail contracts particularly alluring.
Gulf Times
1 November
