Turkey to spend USD 3.5 billion for railway projects in 2010

Turkey aims to focus on high-speed train service in 2010 and plans to invest around 3.5 billion USD next year to improve country's railroad network, head of Turkish State Railways, or TCDD, said on Wednesday.

"Our projects planned for 2010 are worth 3.5 billion USD," Süleyman Karaman said.

In March 2009, Turkey launched country's first high-speed train service between the Turkish capital Ankara and the central province of Eskisehir on a 240-kilometer line.

TCDD is working to extend this line from Ankara to Konya in south, and from Eskişehir to İstanbul in the west.

"I think we will launch services to İstanbul from Eskişehir by the end of 2012 or the beginning of 2013. We will also finish the high-speed railroad from Ankara to Konya by end-2010," he said.

Karaman stated that TCDD would carry out projects to better several parts of Turkey's domestics railroad network, adding that efforts to complete international lines --from Syria's Aleppo to Şanlıurfa in southeast Turkey and from Georgia's Tbilisi to Kars in northeast Turkey-- were under way.


Source: todayszaman.com