Trans-Iranian railway
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How it came to be
The Trans-Iranian Railway runs 1,394 km from the Caspian Sea in the north-east to the Persian Gulf in the south-west. Construction began in 1927 under Reza Shah, who had come to the throne in 1925, and the whole line opened on 26 August 1938. Parliament funded it through domestic taxes on sugar and other goods to avoid foreign debt and control, unusual for an early railway.
The first test lines ran inland from both ends. In April 1933 Iran signed a contract with the Danish firm Kampsax, which divided the work into 43 lots and let them to European, American and Iranian companies. The line was finished under budget and ahead of schedule, with more than 65,000 engineers, office staff and labourers.
Along the line stand 174 large bridges, 186 smaller ones, 224 tunnels, 11 of them spirals, and 89 stations. The terminal ports were then called Bandar Shah and Bandar Shahpur. It was inscribed as a World Heritage site in 2021.
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