Comments on: Trains Under Baghdad

By: zilfondel

zilfondel — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 08:39:53 +0000

Its going to be built by Iraqis, not American construction companies.

Also, Baghdad has some 10 million people in the city and Metro area. It is one of the largest cities in the world. The streets are already more crowded than Manhattan, LA, or Mexico City.

By: jmc

jmc — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 17:04:20 +0000

They need to work on more basic infrastructure right now: Power, water, and sewers. Then they can work on building a real bus system.

That map is from the initial Saddam-era plan in the 80s.

We should all hang our heads in shame for the horrible things we did and continue to do to those people who never attacked us.

By: Boris

Boris — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 16:26:43 +0000

Somebody should somehow swindle Halliburton into building something in the US using US money, as opposed to in Iraq using US money. And if benefitting Iraq at our expense would remain mandatory, we can use Iraqi labor.

By: Cap'n Transit

Cap'n Transit — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:05:00 +0000

I would also point out that there are recently constructed subway systems in Tehran, Shiraz and Yerevan. Other cities in the Middle East planning rail systems include Kuwait, Dubai, Riyadh, Mecca, Abu Dhabi and Qatar.

By: Cap'n Transit

Cap'n Transit — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 12:57:17 +0000

A bad idea that will never happen.

Let's just say what that is: the lamest naysaying possible. If it'll never happen, why bother telling people it's a bad idea?

Of course reliable power is necessary for any good subway, but a subway helps a city run efficiently so that it's economically capable of maintaining its water and power supplies.

If a subway is a bad idea, then so are all the road-building projects that the US has undertaken in Iraq.

By: CollegeEd

CollegeEd — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 09:08:28 +0000

Lets just say what this is. A bad idea that will never happen. They have been having enough trouble just getting water and power throughout the city let-alone a mondern subway. Also anytype of mass transit is just a good target in Bagdad...."hey a whole bunch of the people I dont like..." Wont happen atleast not in the next 20years and by then the middle-east will have spent their oil wealth on everything but investing in the peoples long term intrest.

By: LN

LN — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 01:38:02 +0000

There are serious laws regulating digging for infrastructure in Iraq (and the US and most other countries) requiring archaeological investigations before. This is why it took decades to build the Rome and Athens subway. Anywhere you drop a spade in Iraq you will find some portion of its 12+ millennia of history and pre-history.

But US contractors ignore Iraqi and international laws and seek to be exempt from them.

US contractors have already destroyed the un-excavated portions of Babylon by setting up a US army base right on top of them, breaking Iraqi as well as international laws.

Meanwhile, the NYC subway crumbles into archaeological ruins.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 00:10:28 +0000

That is pretty awesome. I hope that one day the funding we use to build Iraq's infrastructure can be used for my hometown in the US to have a subway.

By: Carice

Carice — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 23:18:10 +0000

Politics and symbolism aside, I know that building a subway without destroying archeological finds has been a real challenge for the Rome subway, I imagine that Bagdad must have the same problem, although probably worse, as it's been inhabited longer. I wonder if subway is really the best way to go- perhaps light rail would be better?