Another area where Chinese skills in transport are being used for a positive benefit to the general population, is the Iranian city of Tehran.
You would never know from the general information disseminated by the tame-cat western press, but Tehran is one of west Asia's largest cities with a central population of over 8 million and a wider population of 14 million., covering some 600 sq/km. Tehran is a modern city, in a country with a long history, that fought the eastern Roman empire to the point where both were exhausted, and in Iran's case then fell an easy victim to militant Islam.
Its a beautiful country, in this image you catch a glimpse, not just of the modernity of Tehran, but of the beautiful geographical setting in which the city is located.
You can imagine that a city of that size and complexity is going to have transport problems. Where could they find assistance to build the kind of modern public transport system that a modern city requires to function?
For many years Iran has been sanctioned (shunned) by the west at the USA's behest. Why?
For the answer, we have to go back to the early 1950's and the then Prime Minister, a Dr Mossadegh. Mossadegh was Prime Minister in an elected government and a nationalist who loved his country. He was not an extremist. For years Iranians had chafed at the failure of the British controlled Anglo-Persian Oil Company to properly develop the oil industry. So in 1953, the National Parliament in a near total consensus, voted to nationalise the oil Industry.
This upset the British who were very dependent on Iranian oil at that time. The British M16 secret service and the CIA conspired with a retired Iranian General to lead a coup against the elected government.
This wikepedia entry gives more detail: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat#U.S._role
Popular dissatisfaction with the ensuing governments eventually led to a popular revolution and the current government controlled by Islamic Iman, something in my opinion, that could have been avoided, if the legitimate rights of the Mossadegh government had been respected by the UK and the USA. The political landscape of west Asia would be far different now if Mossadegh had not been removed by the Anglo-American inspired coup.
But western meddling did not stop at that point. After the Islamic revolution, the USA worked with their then man in Iraq, Saddam Hussein (True) as their proxy to fight a six year war with Iran.
Do you begin to see why the west is detested in western Asia, and why it is such a mess, today?
All of which, has not much to do with the transport needs of Tehran, except that it explains that one of the few places that the Iranian government could turn (because of western shunning -i.e. sanctions) with the technical expertise and experience, was China.
In 1985, the Iranian Parliament approved the construction of Tehran Metro which was formally begun a year later. In March 1995, China's CITIC Group signed a contract with Tehran Urban and Suburban Railway to construct line one and line two of the Tehran Metro. In 2001, the first metro constructed by Chinese companies was completed. A factory was established in Tehran to construct some carriages, with the rest being supplied by a Chinese factory in Changchun.
Today, there are five operational subway lines, with a total length of about 150 kilometers and around 110 underground stations. And the number of platforms underground is nearly 110.
Let's catch a subway train in Tehran:
1. Walk through the underground shopping centre to ther station:
2. Buy a ticket at the automatic dispensers:
3. Wait for the train:
4. Board:
5. Off to our destination:
The life of the man-in-the-street in Tehran, is not much different to our own lives.
