Skip to main content

Turkey plans major infrastructure improvements

Turkey recently unveiled ambitious targets towards improving its transportation infrastructure for 2023, the year the country will celebrate its 100th year anniversary as Republic of Turkey. The main means of transportation in Turkey is by highways, and the coach and bus industry has played a crucial role in passenger transportation. The recent increases in the number of airports and charter companies have made travel by plane a potential choice for passengers. However, railways have contributed rather insi
March 22, 2012 Read time: 2 mins

Turkey recently unveiled ambitious targets towards improving its transportation infrastructure for 2023, the year the country will celebrate its 100th year anniversary as Republic of Turkey.

The main means of transportation in Turkey is by highways, and the coach and bus industry has played a crucial role in passenger transportation.

The recent increases in the number of airports and charter companies have made travel by plane a potential choice for passengers. However, railways have contributed rather insignificantly to passenger and freight transportation due to the insufficient and inefficient infrastructure in place.

This, in turn, also affects the efficiency of import/export to/from the country, which is emphasised as one of the biggest threats to the country’s growing economy.
This was discussed at the recent Turkey Transport Infrastructure 2011 held in Istanbul.

Additionally, through such high targets together with the newly announced/launched railway, highway, metro, tunnel projects, Turkey aims to improve the living standard in the cities by decreasing the level of intra-city congestion.

Turkey Transportation Infrastructure 2011 covered key topics surrounding the railway and highway infrastructure in Turkey including grand transportation projects such as 7Hill/7Tunnel for Istanbul; high-speed train construction between Istanbul-Konya-Ankara, and the 3rd Bosphorus Bridge.

The finance resources for such projects were discussed, while the importance of transportation infrastructure for freight transportation was emphasised.

Technical discussions covered various analysis carried out during both national and international projects, and transportation projects initiated by various metropolitan municipalities were presented to showcase successful ongoing/completed projects, and future collaboration with private sector and universities.

FACTS                                                                        2023 TARGETS
 Total vehicle (2001/2009)
 7,342,888 / 12,914,564*
 
 Total Road network
 64865km**
 5436km (to be constructed)**
 Total Motorway    
 2080**    
 5436km (to be constructed)**
 Total Conventional Railway  11052km***  4707km (to be constructed)****
 Total Electrified railway
 2273km***  8717km (to be constructed****
 Total High Speed railway
 888km***  6792km (to be constructed)****
 Freight Transportation (road)
 95%*
 
 Freight Transportation (rail)  3.5%*  20%**** 
 Passenger Transportation(road)    
 95% highway*  
 Passenger Transportation(rail)   
 3% highway*
 15%****
 


*TURKSTAT Road Motor Vehicle Statistics ** General Directorate of State Highways (01/2011)
*** General Directorate of Railways (12/2010) ****10th Turkey Transportation Summit (05/2011)

Related Content

  • Saudi Arabian capital Riyadh benefiting from major transport investment
    September 9, 2013
    Saudi Arabia is undergoing a series of upgrades to its transport network in a bid to improve Traffic flow rates and boost safety - Mike Woof reports. The massive growth in the use of motor transport worldwide since the start of the 20th century has transformed every country on the planet. But perhaps no country has changed more dramatically than Saudi Arabia, the world’s leading oil producer. At the start of the 20th century Saudi Arabia’s population was small and the country had few industries while it is
  • Turkey’s Bosporus bridge opening
    August 25, 2016
    Turkey’s Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge over the Bosporus is having its official opening, which is being carried out by senior members of the country’s government including president Recep Erdoğan. The final sections of the deck structure were put into place in March 2016 and the project, which commenced in 2013, has been completed in record time. This is the third bridge to span the Bosporus at Turkey’s commercial centre, Istanbul and the new crossing will form part of the country’s North Marmara Highway pro
  • Increased infrastructure spending
    February 22, 2012
    With economies booming in the BRIC countries and other regions, spending on infrastructure is at a high - Patrick Smith reports As economic crisis grips much of the world, many countries are still spending billions on infrastructure to improve transportation. While the USA and Europe struggle with debt problems (and this has affected much of the rest of the world) the development of highways, airport, ports and other infrastructure is gathering pace in other regions to boost economic developments.
  • Haulotte wraps it up at Turkey’s Osman Gazi Bridge
    July 5, 2016
    French access group Haulotte and the Turkish access distributor and rental group Acarlar continue to contribute to major infrastructure projects in Turkey, including the new Osman Gazi Bridge. The bridge – the third Bosporus crossing - has just been completed with the installation of the last bridge deck. The bridge will reach a height of 252m and the bridge deck will be nearly 26m wide. When it soon opens, the bridge will be the fourth longest suspension bridge in the world by the length of its central