Private siding at Hairatan

Hairatan Port : Naweed Fardeen Group of companies has his own Train line and port at Hairatan near Uzbekistan border for the purpose of have effectiveness effeciency in the busines for its customers.

There are some photos of the railway line on the website of Naweed Fardeen Group, who in addition to transport and freight forwarding, can supply you with containers, electrical goods, precious stones and carpets. The pictures include a shot of locomotive TEM2-3315

ADB photos of Afghan railways

The Asian Development Bank has uploaded some photos of the Hairatan – Mazar-i-Sharif railway to Flickr today.

Unfortunately ABD seems to have turned off the ability to embed the photos on external websites, so to see them try this link: ADB’s Afghanistan photo set and click around the lninks to railway, railroad etc.

The photos include construction work underwayfor the Mazar-i-Sharif line, freight wagons being unloaded, the Afghan deputy minister of city rehabilitation posing in front of a TEM2 in Mazar-i-Sharif in June 2012 (text says 6 June, metadata says 7 June), and a passenger train(! possibly carrying the minister?) with TEM2-6561 hauling an Uzbek Railways liveried coach.

There are lots of other interesting photos of railway projects in Asia.

Photos of the first commercial train on the Mazar-i-Sharif line

Photographs of the first commercial train to Naibabad (terminus of the new railway from Hairatan to Mazar-i-Sharif), on 3 February 2012.

All photos by David Brice.

The train was hauled by locomotive 2ТЭ10М-2337.

The train comprised nine wagons carrying flour from Kazakhstan and three wagons of Siberian timber.


There is another photo on a 7 February 2012 story from Ariana News For the first time transport of goods by rail commenced in Afghanistan: “The Naibabad port has the capacity of loading and unloading 34 trucks at a time while the local officials are looking to upgrade the capacity of that port.”

The CAREC article Hairatan-Mazar-e-Sharif railway opens, highlights country-to-country cooperation has a photo of an inaugural train arriving at the “newly built Naibabad Station in the city of Mazar-e-Sharif” on 21 December 2011. “Although the seven-carriage train carried no cargo, it brought great opportunity for increased trade and cooperation between Afghanistan and its neighbors in Central Asia”.

Hairatan railway photos

A couple of photographs of Hairatan which the Asian Development Bank has uploaded to Flickr. They are dated 27 August 2011 – and I think they might have the captions the wrong way round.

Rail way
“A private wagon enters from Uzbekistan to the border of Afghanistan Hiaratan in the new rail way line.”

Rail way
“Main station of Rail way in Hairatan border between Uzbekistan and Afghanistan new rail way line. “

Museum photos and an angle iron plan

We saw the old trains of Kabul as well, which was very cool. I knew there was an original railway here but I didn’t know where or if it was still in Kabul.

A Day at the Afghanistan National Museum is an article by Jim Rentfrow at the website of the Green Gem Foundation, “new non-profit organization established to promote the development of ethical gemstones“.

He describes a visit to the museum on 17 December 2011, with some good photos of the “non-plinthed” Henschel steam locos, which along with the remains of the coaches seem to have gained a roof over them, which is good news.

Angle iron

Angle Iron Rail Project is Green Gem Foundation project to fund a “rudimentary rail system” based on trolleys running on angle iron tracks to ease work in gem mines in Kunduz, Nuristan or elsewhere. Apparently coal and peridot mines in Pakistan use this system.

King Amanullah’s 1920’s Train

King Amanullah's 1920's Train

Amanullah sought German companies and engineers into the country to build roads, bridges, dams and royal palace in Darulaman, a suburb of Kabul. The locomtives were transported by ship to Mumbai and then pulled by elephant in passes through the Hindu Kush, where a couple of hundred metres of rail were laid. After 20+ years of civil war turmoil and the destruction of Kabul, they’re overgrown by thistles and thorn bushes are three rusty steam engines and the carriage labelled “Made in Germany”

Flickr photo by Tanya Murphy (username “turnip!”, © All Rights Reserved), taken on 2 November 2009.