All Aboard the Baghdad Commuter Rail!

Just like American commuters, Baghdad's workers have to contend with ever-worsening traffic jams, urban pollution, and limited parking. Of course, Iraqi commuters also have to deal with security checkpoints and the possibility of roadside bombs -- far worse threats than an accident in the carpool lane.

Now, Baghdad's commuters have another option: a commuter train that travels from the suburbs to the center of the city. "The train is faster than cars, it avoids stopping in traffic jams and
dozens of checkpoints that people obliged to pass through," an anonymous Iraqi Transport Ministry
official told the Chinese Xinhua news agency. Fares are 80 cents and some lucky riders get the chance to travel in Saddam's old personal train -- complete with chandeliers and Italian-made curtains. 

You'd think that would be enough to get drivers out of their Caprices and onto the rails, but just like Americans, Baghdad's commuters complain that trains don't run frequently enough and the stops are too far from work and home. Those ridership issues don't give us much hope for commuter rail in the US, and we don't even have an $80 billion surplus.

The 15 mile line stops in both Sunni and Shiite neighborhoods, from the mostly-Shiite Kasimiyah neighborhood north of the city to the mostly-Sunni Yousifiyah neighborhood south of the city. Every train stops at the main blue-domed train station in central Baghdad (shown above and in the video below), which was once a stop on the famous Orient Express.

Abdul-Ameer Hamoud, Iraq's director of central transport, told the AP that the train would be the quickest way in and out of the city. "The arrival of
a passenger by train is faster than by car to and from the center of
Baghdad," he said. A trip that would take more than an hour and a half by car may take only a few minutes by train. Rail travel also appears to be fairly safe by Iraqi standards. Xinhua reports that blast walls protect each station, while riders are screened through metal detectors before boarding the trains.

Even with the added security and ease of use, Iraqis aren't thrilled about the location of stations. "I don't think the train would be better than cars, despite the city's
checkpoints and congestion, because the growing of neighborhoods in Baghdad city
is horizontal and our houses spread in wide areas in the capital," government employee Jaber
al-Samarraie told Xinhua.

Photo courtesy flickr user labanex, video courtesy YouTube user USACEGRD