In the Haroun Al-Rashid Square in Heliopolis the cars pass easily by except in one residential street, Al-Nozha, in which yellow metal barriers have closed it off to complete the fourth phase of the third line of Cairo's Metro. The street is a busy one, with a school and homes on both sides. Children are playing in front of the metal barriers, with some parents waiting silently for their children or chatting with each other above the sounds of digging. In some areas it is difficult to walk because of the sand and rubble on the ground. “There is not much noise, but there is the dust that comes into our apartments. A water pipe was also accidentally broken during the digging and there is a street that has been flooded with water,” commented one resident, Inas, who lives in Al-Montaza Street. Another housewife who chose to speak under condition of anonymity said that “some three-quarters of the inhabitants are elderly and can't use the pedestrian bridges that have been set up over the construction work. We have problems parking our cars near our homes or moving around the area, even though the digging has moved a few blocks away from us. We also have a problem with the rubbish in the street and rubble left by workers where there is the school our children go. We still suffer from the sand, with those with asthma suffering the most.” “I don't think there is such a big problem now. We hear the sounds of digging, but less than it was in the past. Our main problem is with the traffic jams in the area,” comments Moatassem Hassan who lives in a street parallel to the project. “I believe that the project is beneficial to the country. We should all be patient. They are working day and night to finish this great project. Anyway, it is not a workshop or a factory that will keep on making a noise: It is a project that will come to an end one day,” comments Sabri who works in a nearby company. According to undersecretary at the Ministry of Transport and head of the Planning Department at the National Authority for Tunnels (NAT) Tarek Abul-Wafa, “an engineer in the location is responsible for the project in each district. The inhabitants should directly contact him if a problem appears. If there is a water pipe broken during the digging, he must fix it, for example. People should also not hesitate to contact us if there are problems,” he said. “The third line of the Metro is divided into four phases on the basis of priorities,” he added. “There are two types of priorities: Priorities related to transportation including passenger numbers and technical priorities.” The latter are exemplified in the workshops at the end of the line that can be easily reached when trains need renovation. “We started with the downtown area of Cairo to decrease the population pressure in it, and the second line is also partly in the downtown area where it is still very crowded. The third line of the metro starts from Ataba and goes to extremely crowded places in Greater Cairo such as Imbaba and Boulaq Al-Dakrour. The fourth phase of the third line starts from Haroun Street at the crossroads of Abu-Bakr Al-Seddik near the English School, goes under Haroun Street, passing by the former Al-Nozha Street, (now General Mahmoud Adel Street) until Heliopolis Square, and then to the Alf Maskan Square, passing by Gesr Al-Suez Street until Al-Shams Club and the Al-Salam Hotel.” “Then it goes underneath Al-Nozha Street to the bus station before reappearing above ground on a bridge that will be built for it to reach the Hesham Barakat Square, Qubba, Omar Ibn Al-Khattab, and Al-Heikstep Stations,” Abul-Wafa said. The last phase will reach Adli Mansour at the 10th of Ramadan bus station. “There is another branch of this stage that goes to Heliopolis under the Al-Higaz Square, then the end of Higaz Street at the horse track of the Al-Shams Club passing by the Military Academy and the Sheraton Complex to end at Terminal 3 of Cairo International Airport. This covers most of the Heliopolis, Ain Shams and Alf Maskan districts in which there is a high population density,” he said.
THIRD LINE ROUTE: According to the Website of the National Authority for Tunnels, the path of the third stage of the metro will go from the Imbaba and Mohandessin districts on the west bank of the Nile, pass under the Nile to Zamalek Island, and then go on to Ataba Square, Abbassiya, the Cairo Stadium, Heliopolis and the Alf Maskan and Gesr Al-Suez districts to end up at the Cairo International Airport. The overall length is 34.2 km. It is the first horizontal line, as it goes from the east to the west of Cairo and joins the two previous lines which were vertical and went from the north to the west of Cairo. It aims to tie the east of Cairo to the west of Cairo and will consist of 39 stations, 27 underground stations, two above-ground stations and 11 stations on bridges. It is being implemented in four phases. According to the NAT Website, the fourth phase starts from Haroun Al-Rashid Station in Heliopolis taking an underground root until Al-Nozha Station that is 5.15 km long. It continues above ground until the Al-Salam Station and the Adli Mansour Station near the 10th of Ramadan bus station for a length of 6.37 km. There is another branch that goes from Haroun Al-Rashid Station until Cairo International Airport Terminal 3 on an underground path of 6.65 km. The overall length is 18.17 km divided into 15 stations. “One of the reasons behind reaching the 10th of Ramadan Station is that there is a piece of land on the desert road behind it that can be used for a workshop,” said Abul-Wafa. It was a substitute for the Gessema workshop near the Rod Al-Farag crossroads on the west of the ring-road, which is an agricultural area. This will save some 115 feddans of land, according to the NAT Website. Abul-Wafa explained why the digging had taken more than three years in the Haroun Al-Rashid area. “We originally planned for the project to be completed within 34 months in July 2015, but due to some facility problems some locations were handed over late, including Heliopolis, which was six months late. The Haroun district also has a different status. When we were carrying out the second line, we planned to end with the Al-Ahram Street in Heliopolis, and we were going to build a building there for the digging machine. However, we were ordered to finish this earlier so that we could start the line that leads to the New Administrative Capital on the Ismailia Road to meet the transportation needs of the East Cairo Cities area.” “This meant we had to work in the Haroun district at the end of the second phase, which was originally supposed to be part of the fourth phase. This is why it took a long time, some three years, because it ties the two together,” he said, adding that there had also been problems of oil being detected at the Al-Nozha site. “This caused us to try to finish the phase on time. The contractor's delays have added one year to the project, but we are pushing as much as we can to finish on time,” he said. “We have finished 90 per cent of the construction work in the Haroun district, and more than 75 per cent of that in the Alf Maskan and Al-Shams Club. We are working on the finishing touches to the stations. We may start implementing the electrical and mechanical features by the beginning of 2017,” he added. “The line is composed of two parts, 4A and 4B. There are six stations in 4A, including Haroun, Heliopolis, Alf Maskan, the Police Club, Ain Shams and Al-Nozha. In 4B there are five stations, Hesham Barakat, Qobba, Omar Ibn Al-Khattab, Al-Heikstep and Adli Mansour, making 11 in total. In the line to the Airport there will be about six stations, but this number is still under study,” Abul-Wafa said. The idea is to see what can be finished after the end of the original period, as it cannot be determined before that due to the problems that have appeared. Abul-Wafa explained the reason behind the digging at night. “We are working 24 hours a day, as our schedule is extremely pressured. We have shifts around the clock. Starting from next year, by February or March all the heavy equipment such as the trucks that take the rubble and the concrete mixers will be transferred to the Alf Maskan district. Crowd density should decrease by 50 per cent in the Haroun district, and then all that will be needed will be the finishing touches to the stations. People will be happy to find a metro station next to their homes instead of looking for a place to park their cars for two hours,” he said. “When the third line of the metro is complete, it will serve about two million passengers. The first line served 350,000 passengers per day. After the second line was completed, 600,000 passengers used it per day. The three combined will exceed a million passengers per day. When we finish the fourth, it will exceed two million passengers per day.” According to a press release on 10 October, a contract has been signed between representatives of the government including Minister of Transport Galal Al-Said, chairman of the National Authority for Tunnels, Tarek Gamaleddin, and the Ambassador of Japan to Egypt, Takehiro Kagawa, as well as representatives of the Japan International Co-operation Agency, to implement the first phase of the fourth line of the metro. “According to feasibility studies, the first part of this will serve some 700,000 passengers. This will decrease traffic congestion in areas like Al-Haram Street and Giza Square, which are the most crowded in Greater Cairo. The overall capacity will be 1.8 million passengers when it is complete,” Al-Said said. “All the studies for this phase were done by Japanese consultants and funded by the Japanese government. The studies of the second phase that extends from Amr Ibn Al-Aas to Al-Tagammu Al-Awal will start as soon as the first phase has been implemented, as the Japanese government has promised,” commented Gamaleddin. Bids have started to choose the contractors for this new phase. The first phase of the fourth line of the metro will extend from the far west of Cairo from 6 October City to Al-Tagammu Al-Awal and Al-Rehab City for a length of 43 km. It will pass through many Pharaonic and Islamic tourist sites. It will extend from the west of the ring-road passing by Hadaeq Al-Ahram, the Grand Egyptian Museum, the Pyramids area, Al-Haram Street, Giza Square, Al-Roda and Al-Malek Al-Saleh, and then on to the Amr Ibn Al-Aas Station at the Fustat Gardens where the first line ends. The second phase of the fourth line of the metro will extend to Al-Qalaa (Salah Al Din Citadel) district, passing by Nasr City and New Cairo and then to the crossroads of the ring-road on the Cairo-Suez Road. Passengers coming from Giza can change direction to go to the second line of the metro, and passengers coming from Al-Malek Al-Saleh can change to the first line.
