Improving Transportation in Saudi Arabia

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Improving Public Transportation Advantages in Saudi Arabia Introduction: Since the establishment of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia by King Abdul Aziz in 1932, and especially after oil was discovered in its lands in 1938, the country has enjoyed a huge transformation in every imaginable aspect (Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia, n.d.). The government became rich and the economy started to grow rapidly. Because money was not an issue anymore for the government a substantial amount of it was spent on building infrastructure to bring prosperity to the nation. One of these projects was the transportation system. Paved roads, streets and highways were constructed rapidly through the vast country lands, connecting major and smaller cities together. Also, they connected the kingdom with its neighboring countries. In the years between 1950 an 1991, the Saudi Arabian government succeeded in constructing 100,000 kilometers of roads, 35,000 kilometers of these were paved (Photius, n.d.). At the same time, because of increasing trade locally and internationally, when the country was becoming wealthy, its people were becoming wealthy too. And their purchasing power became stronger. Many individuals were able to buy their own cars to commute to their jobs and to travel between cities. And for those who did not buy a car or did not want to travel long distances, they used airplanes and the bus network which were established by the government to reach distant cities. The transportation network between cities in Saudi Arabia is extensive. However inside the cities the condition is not the same. And this will be the topic of this paper. We will start explaining the current situation of the public transportation in Saudi Arabia and how limited it is, and why developing process for the network did not proceeded as it usually happens in any developing country. Then, mentioning some statistics
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