Well, Jordan has some great new plan, it really could work I think. If--and this is a big if--the bidding process is really transparent and honest. Which is a big IF in Jordan. That having been said, I wish the Kingdom the best of luck in this new endeavor. Heaven knows they have a real problem with unemployment (25%) and rising fundamentalism.
AMMAN (AFP) — Jordan plans to begin work on a six-billion-dollar railway next year to bolster trade with its neighbours and create jobs for its cash-strapped population, Transport Minister Sahl Majali told AFP in an interview.
"The 4.5-billion-dinar project is vital to Jordan because it will make freight movement faster and easier, cut transportation costs and boost trade," Majali said on Tuesday.
"It will also create massive job opportunities for Jordanians."
The railway would link the Red Sea port of Aqaba with the Syrian border, through Amman and then the industrial city of Zarqa -- the two largest cities in the largely desert country.
Extending some 1,600 kilometres (about 990 miles), the railway would also link the Saudi and Iraqi borders with Jordan's northern city of Irbid and the northeastern towns of Mafraq and Azraq.
Work will begin next year and is scheduled to be completed by 2013, Majali said. The focus will initially be on freight services, with passenger trains planned for the future. [...]
AFP.
2 comments:
If memory serves me correctly the Ottomans had no end of trouble securing the railway down the Hejaz from Arab bandits. I'm not convinced that, in the era of al-Qaeda, the Jordanians are going to have a better go at it, either during construction or operation.
They did have such problems indeed. I think this time the pilfering will come from government officials though, not bedu raiders.
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