High-speed rail in Turkey

Türkiye plans to increase the number of high-speed train services in the face of rising demand, Transport Minister Adil Karaismailoğlu has said.

The number of those train services will increase from the current 44 to 56 starting Sept. 10, while passenger capacity will be boosted by 5,200, according to the minister.

The Turkish State Railways (TCDD) has signed a contract for 10 Velaro high-speed trains with Siemens, which submitted the most favorable bid in the tender.

Construction work has commenced on the high-speed railway connecting the capital Ankara to the central Anatolian province of Sivas. 

The director of Siemens Turkey's high speed trains department has said the company plans to bid in a tender expected to be opened by the Transport Ministry to buy a total of 80 high speed trains in mid-2016. 

"We want to bid and we are evaluating the process now," said Siemens' Cüneyt Genç in an interview with Reuters. 

France's Alstom plans to bid in a tender for high-speed rail in Turkey and would spend 100 million euros on a production plant, the head of the transport group's Turkish unit told Reuters on March 3.

Arban Ç?tak also said that Alstom has chosen a local partner for the bid, but has yet to announce the partner's name. 

Newly-married couple Y?lmaz Elmascan and Gülhan Karl? Elmascan died together along with their friends from the United Trade Union of Transportation Workers in Ankara. They were married only one year ago. 

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan inaugurated a high speed train link from Istanbul to the Central Anatolian city of Konya on Dec. 17, which cuts journey times by nearly nine hours.
      
Erdoğan himself opened the line at a ceremony in Konya, 460 kilometers southeast of Istanbul, and declared that all travel on it would be free for the first week.
      

Turkey’s sprawling high-speed railway network will also boost train station construction across the country, as a total of 21 new stations are planned at routes through which trains pass.

The long-awaited high-speed railway line between Ankara and Istanbul will be opened on July 11, Transport Minister Lütfi Elvan said on July 2.

The opening of the line, which was postponed in May after signaling cables were cut and stolen, will cut the journey time between the two cities to three and a half hours. It currently takes around six hours by road.