Turkish State Railways
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Categories: Rail transport in Turkey | Turkish State Railways | Transport operators of Turkey | Ottoman railways
Turkish Republic State Railways (Turkish: Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Devlet Demiryolları or TCDD) is the state corporation that operates the public railway system in Turkey. The organization was founded in 1927 to take over the operation of railways that were left within the borders of the Turkish Republic after the dissolution of Ottoman Empire, which up until then had been run and financed by private corporations. TCDD operates over 8500 kilometres of railway lines and is a member of InterRail.
OperationAs the sole train operator in the country, TCDD operates both passenger, freight and suburban railways, including domestic and international departures. Until the opening of the Marmaray the country has two networks only connected by the Bosporus railway ferry in Istanbul. International servicesImage:Sirkeci-station Orient Express.JPG
Sirkeci Terminal on the European side of Istanbul was opened in 1890 as the terminus of the Orient Express
Image:Haydarpasha train station istanbul.jpg
Haydarpaşa Terminal on the Asian side of Istanbul was opened in 1908 as the terminus of the Istanbul-Baghdad and Istanbul-Damascus-Medina railways
European services (from Sirkeci Terminal)
Middle East services (from Haydarpaşa Terminal)
SuburbanThere are four independent commuter train services in Turkey, two in Istanbul, one in Ankara and one in Izmir, operated by TCDD. All four services operate using either E8000 and/or E14000 electric multiple units. The systems operate at up to quarter hour headway, though they are not particularly well integrated into each cities remaining urban rail systems. HistoryOttoman railwaysThe history of Turkish Railways dates back to 1856. The first railway line in Turkey was the 130 km İzmir - Aydın line, on which a British Company was appointed. The choice of this particular spot was not random. The İzmir - Aydın track was built because of its high commercial potential. Another reason was that this particular area had raw materials that were necessary for British industry. Also this area was important for controlling the Middle East, and at that time of the Ottoman Empire after the English were given the first license, France and Germany began to build up different areas where they exercised their power. Those countries tried to deliver the goods that were necessary for their industries, that they bought from the Ottoman Empire, as fast as possible to the seaports. The railways were built to be as efficient as possible, and were strategically placed, for example being within around 20 km of mines, etc. So the railways were actually placed according to the politics of those foreign countries. Between the years 1856 - 1922 the following tracks were built in the realm of the Ottoman Empire:
Total 9,919 km In this case after the Republic was declared in Turkey, only 4000 km of the railway tracks that were built by foreign companies were left within the national borders. To be more precise, the young Turkish Republic inherited from the Ottoman Empire 2,282 km standard gauge lines and 70 km narrow gauge lines owned by foreign companies and 1,378 km standard gauge lines owned and operated by the former Ottoman Empire. 1923 - 1950: The railway periodBefore the Republic was announced the railway tracks were build for the benefit of the foreign countries, but after the formation of the Republic in Turkey the railway tracks were built for the good of the Republic. This can be clearly seen of the industrialization plans released between 1932 and 1936 which were based on iron and coal etc. The cheapest and most efficient way to transport those goods was to build railways. In those years the financial assets of transportation were transferred to railways. In those years of shortage, the construction of railways continued on high-speed. During the Second World War the constructions slowed down. 3,578 km of the tracks that were build between 1923 and 1950, 3,208 km were completed before 1940. At those times the railways were included in the National Economy procedures. The aim of constructing railways were stated as:
To reach those targets the railway politics were lead in two stages:
Between 1935 and 1945 the railways were joined. Those joinings created cycles in the railways which for example shortened the distance between Ankara - Diyarbakır from 1,324 km to 1,116 km. 1950 and after: the Golden Road periodThe road system that was left from the Ottoman Empire, consisted of 13,885 km ruined surface roads, and 4.450 km stabilized roads, which totaled 18,335 km and 94 bridges. The road systems was seen until 1950 as a system to aid the railways. But instead of strengthening the rail network, the automobile roads were extended because of the Marshall plan. After 1960 even though there were many targets that aimed at the extension of the railroads, most of the financial assets were transferred into automobile roads. Because of these politics, between the years 1950 and 1980 an average of 30 km of railroads were constructed. In the mid 1980s in Turkey a mobilization was started to build Autobahns, the Autobahns project was the third largest project after the Southeastern Anatolia Project and tourism projects. Because of those projects, until the mid 1990s about USD 2 billion were invested. In these years no investments were made to railroads, and no projects were initiated. Most of the railways (most of them more than 50 years old) were left to their own fate. In Turkey goods are carried 94% on roads, and only 4% are carried on railroads. The share of goods transportation in Turkey by trains deceased in 50 years by 60%. ElectrificationTurkey has chosen to electrify at the conventional 25 kV 50 Hz AC. The first lines electrified were the Istanbul suburban lines on the European side, from Sirkeci to Soğuksu on December 4, 1955, and at the same time the E8000 electrical multiple units were taken into use. The Asian side suburban lines from Haydarpaşa to Gebze were electrified in 1969, while the Ankara suburban trains were electrified in 1972, on the line from Sincan to Kayaş. On February 6, 1977 the track from Gebze to Adapazarı were made double track and electrified, allowing the first main line operation of electric trains in Turkey. The line from Arifiye outside Adapazarı to Eskişehir were further electrified in 1989 and in 1993 to Sincan, allowing electric train passage from Istanbul to Ankara. In 1994 the European line from Istanbul to Edirne, Kapıkule and the Bulgarian border were also electrified. The same year the line from Divriği to İskenderun in Eastern Turkey was also electrified, though this line is not connected to the rest of the electrified network. In 2006 the Izmir suburban system was also electrified. Tracks constructed before the RepublicStill in use
Scrapped narrow-gauge railways
Projects under constructionMarmaray Project
The Marmaray project is a shared-rail underground tunnel system which will connect the rail lines in the European and Asian sides of Istanbul under the Bosporus in Istanbul. It will thereby actually connect the European rail networks to the Middle Eastern and Asian rail networks. In addition, the tunnel will also have an important role in intracity transport, forming an east-west rail system line for the massively populated Istanbul metropolitan area. It is projected to relieve public transportation problems while increasing the percentage of the use of rail systems in public transportation from 3,6% to 27,7%. Such an increase would put Istanbul third in the world with regard to the use of public transportation, behind Tokyo (60%) and New York (31%). Image:Tcdd network.png
Turkish State Railways network: High-speed rail tracks under construction and in plan
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The first ten TCDD High Speed Train sets
Image:TUVASAS-ROTEM HSR-350X.jpg
Inauguration ceremony of the TÜVASAŞ-ROTEM factory in Adapazarı, Turkey, which will licence build the HSR-350X trains
High-Speed Rail ProjectsIstanbul - Ankara High-Speed TrackThe first high-speed railway will connect Ankara via Eskişehir to Istanbul. With this project, a trip from Istanbul to Ankara will take only about 3 hours at a maximum speed of 250 km/h. Trains for this section have been ordered from Spanish CAF. Ankara - KonyaThis new railway, that will dramatically shorten the travel time between Ankara and Konya to 70 minutes, will connect to the Istanbul-Ankara Line in Polatli. The same type of CAF trains will be used on this line. Future Possibilities
See also
External links
de:Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Devlet Demiryolları fr:TCDD id:Turkish State Railways hu:Törökország vasúti közlekedése pl:Historia kolei w Turcji sk:Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Devlet Demiryolları sv:Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Devlet Demiryolları tr:Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Devlet Demiryolları | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
