Salem Bin Ahmed Sahab
Al-Madina
THE Haramain Railway that links the holy cities of Makkah and Madinah has become a disrupted dream. This multibillion riyal speed train project is a great news for people who dream about this state-of-the-art public transport system with five stations in Makkah, Madinah, Rabigh, King Abdulaziz Aziz Airport and Sulaimaniya in Jeddah.
Unfortunately, the project is delayed due to the inundation of a tunnel near the railway’s Sulaimaniya Station through which it passes. Naturally, a number of reasons and explanations have been presented to justify the delay by authorities while many people have leveled their accusations against the Saudi Railway Organization, which has refuted them.
But the dreamers of the railway like me have to pay a heavy price for its recurrent delay like that of the newly expanded King Abdulaziz International Airport. God alone knows how many more months the two projects would take for people to enjoy their world-class services.
The tunnel’s flooding, which is a big tragedy, should be tackled as quickly as possible after finding out its root cause. Up till now authorities have not disclosed the reason for the flooding as a result rumors and speculations have spread. Some people say it was caused by Musk Lake, which we thought had become part of history after the municipality removed its water.
There are others who say it is a problem not linked with the National Water Company and Jeddah Mayoralty and cannot be solved by the two organizations. Should we look for the party that caused the problem or find out its reason? In my opinion we have to detect the reason to find a quick solution for the problem.
The authorities have to find a permanent solution for the problem, not a superficial one, in order to save the billions of riyals that have been invested in the project, which has been delayed several times in the past due to different reasons, thus increasing its cost.
We believe that researchers at King Abdulaziz University, which is located close to Sulaimaniya, are capable of presenting a scientific solution for the problem. The university has a faculty for environment, a center for water research and a center of excellence for environment research.
There are several experts and scientists at the university who will be of big help to address the Sulaimaniya tunnel issue. We should not ignore them while looking for a solution like we did in the case of dead fish at Jeddah Corniche.
We don’t have huge funds like before to spend lavishly on these projects. Rationalization of expenditure is today’s slogan. There is no need to talk profusely on reducing expenditure at this time of austerity. We don’t need to spend on foreign experts who will charge huge amounts to solve the problem. Even the foreign experts would make use of local experts paying them peanuts.
I believe that we should make use of experts and scientists who are available in the Kingdom, instead of bringing foreign experts spending huge amounts of money on their salaries and benefits.
