China plans to invest in Iran’s subway development plans as per the 25-year cooperation deal recently signed between the two countries.
Tehran Mayor Pirouz Hanachi said China is to help Iran expand its public transportation network in 10 cities, including Tehran, Mashhad, Isfahan, Tabriz and Shiraz, by providing subway wagons, ISNA reported.
Hanachi said China’s financial and technical assistance for boosting subway construction by selling train cars and related equipment has a long history.
“However, the new current cooperation agreement entails investments on a wider scale,” he added.
China and Iran, both subject to US sanctions, signed the cooperation agreement in late March to strengthen their longstanding economic and political alliance.
“Relations between the two countries have now reached the level of strategic partnership and China seeks to comprehensively improve relations with Iran,” Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told the local media.
Iranian officials are optimistic that the new collaboration plans will be of great help for harnessing the mobility potentials of Iranian metropolises and making life more convenient for citizens.
According to Iran’s urban managers, Tehran subway lines 6, 7 and the newly designed line 10, which are currently under construction, will be prioritized for receiving foreign investments.
When fully constructed, Line 6 will stretch over 38 km and have 27 stations. It will be the longest line in the subway network and connect Shahr-e Rey in southeast Tehran to the famed Sulqan rural district in the northwest.
The 27-km Line 7, which will connect the northwest to southeastern parts of Tehran, will have 25 stations after completion.
Line 3 terminals and their link to Iran’s railroads in District 18 are also under construction. The line is one of the most important Tehran subway paths, as it connects southwest Tehran to the northeast and crosses busy parts of the capital city.
Stretched over 253 kilometers across the capital, Tehran Metro constitutes seven operating lines (Line 1 to 7).
Pressured by US sanctions since the summer of 2018, Iran has made efforts to cut reliance on foreign resources and keep urban development plans afloat via domestic potentials.
Accordingly, local knowledge-based companies and tech firms unveiled a largely localized subway wagon in August 2020.
The plan for expanding domestic producers’ share in subway development was launched a decade ago and their efforts have finally paid off.
Experts say the localization project saves up to €12 million for providing each train.
TM says Tehran subway needs 1,500 wagons, the production of which will boost urban transportation capacity by 6 million people.
Metro’s Budget Deficit
Last September, Mohammad Alikhani, the head of Tehran City Council’s Transportation Commission, said the subway’s network in the capital needs 2 quadrillion rials ($7.78 billion) for the construction of unfinished lines, purchase of train cars and standardization of equipment.
He added that due to the negative effects of US sanctions, Iran’s rial is losing value against hard currencies, making it a tough task to expand and renew Tehran’s ailing public transportation.
Since the US reimposed sanctions against Iran in 2018, the rial has lost 70% of its value against the greenback over the past year. On Saturday, the US dollar was trading at 257,000 rials in Tehran while it hardly fetched 42,000 rials in March 2018.
“A train wagon cost 50 billion rials a couple of years ago, but now the price reaches 200 billion rials, which Tehran Municipality cannot afford,” Alikhani said.
Mohsen Hashemi, the head of TCC, also expressed disquiet over Tehran subway’s shortfalls and said, “While the subway lines have been extended around the city by 80 kilometers in the past several years, not enough trains have been added to the metro’s network.”
Iran-China Cooperation Draft
In June 2020, the Iranian government reviewed and approved the final draft of the 25-year roadmap for Iran-China strategic relations based on long-term mutual interests.
According to President Hassan Rouhani, the primary purpose of this plan is to promote bilateral strategic cooperation at regional and international levels using a win-win approach.
This plan prepares the ground for Iran-China collaboration in key projects and infrastructural development, including the ambitious Belt and Road Initiative, a multi-trillion-dollar infrastructure scheme intended to stretch from East Asia to Europe, the president said then.
“It is an opportunity to attract investment in different economic sectors such as industry, tourism, information technology and communications,” he added.
Belt and Road Initiative is a global development strategy promoted by the Chinese government.
Iran prepared the 25-year roadmap for strategic relations with China and Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif presented it to Chinese authorities during his visit to Beijing in early 2019. The document outlines a vision for long-term cooperation between the two countries in various sectors.
Rouhani said enhancing opportunities for nations to derive shared benefits is a plausible way of improving regional and international security.
"Linking security and development through multilateralism will guarantee the peace and progress of human society," he said.
Rouhani highlighted longstanding relations between the two countries in multiple sectors, stressing the "strategic importance" of new equations in Tehran-Beijing ties.
"The two sides have always stressed the need to enhance strategic cooperation and today, both countries are in a suitable condition to take bigger steps along this line," he said.
