The context The history of railways in Ethiopia dates back to early XXth century when a French engineer took charge of the construction of a railway between Addis-Ababa and Djibouti.
Once completed, in 1917, the line was
operated by the CFE, the Compagnie du Chemin de
Fer Franco-Ethiopien [the Franco-Ethiopian railway
company]. It consists of a metric single track railway,
of length 681km, placed on metal sleepers.
This is a
technique that can be found in numerous pioneering
railways constructed in Africa in the same period.
The line was taken out of service entirely in 2006,
leaving the population without any modern means of
public transport, even though the ownership level of
private vehicles is no more than 10% of the population.
In order to develop the country, the Ethiopian government
has launched a plan to relaunch the railway service
within five years: the GTP or Growth and Transportation
Plan. The aim is to improve transport networks and
connect Ethiopia’s towns to its ports and bordering
countries.
The NRNE (National Railway Network of
Ethiopia) is one of its schemes which comprises 2
phases and a total of 11 projects. In the longer term,the ambition of the Ethiopian government is to have
in place some 2,000km of railway. Among the Phase 1
projects is the Awash-Kombolcha – Hara Gebeya line,
which will connect to the Addis-Djibouti line at the
Awash station.
This new line, still single track, but of standard pitch,
will be dedicated to passenger and goods transport,
with an annual capacity of 17.5 million tons of freight.
Its entry into service is scheduled for 2018. Serving
an area of the country experiencing rapid growth, in
particular, the towns of Kombolcha, Dessié, Shewarobit
and Hayk, the line will allow a journey time of 4h15m
(at a speed of 120km/h) between its two terminals.
Some twenty trains a day are expected to run.
The challenge
407km of new railway to construct, comprising:
• 390km of new single track
• 17km of tracks at stationsIn addition to the tracks, the following must be delivered:
• 10 stations, including 3 stations with several platforms
• 12 tunnels, including 2 that are more than 1km in
length
• 73 rail and road bridges, including 20 with spans
greater than 100m
• A control centre
• Electrification of the line, including 8 substations
• A workshop and depot for rolling stock
• A dry port
• A road for access to the site.
• 2012: Early exploratory design studies
• 2014: Signing of the ERC/YM contract
• 2015: SYSTRA begins work on the project
• 2016: Tunnel boring starts
• 2018: Entry into service
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