The Mashhad Light Rail system is an urban rail network in Mashhad

Mashhad

Mashhad , is the second largest city in Iran and one of the holiest cities in the Shia Muslim world. It is also the only major Iranian city with an Arabic name. It is located east of Tehran, at the center of the Razavi Khorasan Province close to the borders of Afghanistan and Turkmenistan. Its...

, second rapid transit system

Rapid transit in Iran

-Under construction:Along with extension work on the Tehran Metro, six other metro projects are being built. In total, 172 extra kilometers will be built in Tehran between now and 2012 and over 380 kilometers in the other cities...

 in Iran

Iran

Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...

. The project has been known by a number of terms, including "light rail", "urban rail", and "metro".

Construction began in 1999, test train action started on January 4, 2011 , introducing passenger presentation took place on February 21, 2011 , limited eventual trial operations began on March 12,2011, usual service operates since April 24, 2011 (but temporarily by 3 trains with 35 min headways).

Network

Initially, an 19 km route of Line 1 had built with 22 stations. Line 1, runs between Nakhrisi in the east and Vakilabad in the southwest with journey time of 30 min. Approximately half the route are in tunnels and underground stations, other part is on ground.

A further Line 2 will be a conventional heavy metro, running north-south for 14 km between Koohsangi and Tabarsi with 12 stations and is currently under construction by two tunnel boring machine

Tunnel boring machine

A tunnel boring machine also known as a "mole", is a machine used to excavate tunnels with a circular cross section through a variety of soil and rock strata. They can bore through anything from hard rock to sand. Tunnel diameters can range from a metre to almost 16 metres to date...

s

One more line is in planning.

Rolling stock

A fleet of 70 low-floor LRVs was ordered from Chinese Changchun Railway Vehicles. These mark the first time that light rail vehicles have been exported to a customer outside China

China

Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

.