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Fundamental changes in Georgian railways are inevitable!
Given that the Turkish railway network is directly adjacent
to the Georgian railway network, we will definitely have to interact with it,
to varying degrees. We still have this “interaction” today, of course, but it
is only a drop in the ocean - it is necessary to increase its intensity.
The modernization of the “Divrigi - Kars - Georgian border”
railway line will help activate the local economy, create jobs in its immediate
vicinity and help Turkey reduce spatial economic disparities. The fact is that
the four provinces of eastern Turkey, through which the railway line passes,
lag behind the rest of the country in several indicators of economic
well-being. For example, the GDP per capita of the richest province of Erzincan
within the corridor is less than half that of the country’s richest province of
Kocaeli (49%). The Turkish government hopes that the industrial and
agricultural sectors of these provinces will benefit from improved rail
connectivity, both for domestic distribution and for export. This includes
making greater use of the region’s rail-connected logistics clusters, such as
the Kars Logistics Center. The Kars Logistics Center, located at the end of the
Baku-Tbilisi-Kars route, has been underutilized since the opening of the
railway in 2017.
While the economic rationale for investing in the
development of the Divrig-Kars-Georgian border railway line is to increase rail
freight traffic, the line also serves domestic passenger train traffic; its
modernization could enhance socio-economic outcomes in the passenger transport
sector by improving domestic and international traffic in the provinces along
the corridor. While Turkey’s population grew by a third between 2000 and 2023,
the populations of the provinces along the Divrig-Kars-Georgian border railway
line either grew marginally compared to the national growth rate (Erzincan,
+18%) or decreased in absolute terms (Sivas, -0.2%; Erzurum, -6.4%; Kars,
-14.7%) over the same period, with this result largely driven by internal
economic migration to economically more prosperous areas such as the western
part of the Marmara Sea region.
The relative isolation of these provinces, where air travel
is not affordable for many due to current income levels, and the available
train service is limited to one flight per day, with a journey time of 26.5
hours from Kars to Ankara, exacerbates the economic problems of the subregion.
Providing safer, faster and more frequent passenger services between the
provinces along the corridor and destinations in the west (as well as
international destinations in the east) will strengthen national social
cohesion and contribute to a better distribution of capital and jobs across the
economy.
Furthermore, improved technical conditions on the railway
line will allow for the expansion and modernization of the premium-class
tourist train service between Ankara and the provinces along the corridor,
which are major tourist destinations in eastern Turkey. This will further
contribute to the increase in economic activity in the subregion.
The provinces of Turkey through which the “middle corridor”
passes are certainly not foreign to us. Take, for example, Erzurum, “our”
Karnu-Kalak.
At the beginning of the 13th century, Erzurum was a fiefdom of Georgia. After the death of Queen Tamar, around 1213, the Erzurum principality passed from the Georgian throne, but soon Lasha Giorgi invaded and re-established it. In the 1320s of the 13th century, Georgia brought the Dvin-Erzurum trade route under its control. In 1223, Lasha Giorgi betrothed his sister Rusudan to Togrul Shah’s son Khizr al-Din, who converted to Christianity.
Erzurum is therefore the birthplace of King David VI Narin
and the father of Gurji Khatun. In August 2019, it was reported that an
archaeological excavation in the Fasinler district of Erzurum, Turkey,
allegedly uncovered the tomb of granddaughter of Tamar, also known as Gurji
Khatun, the granddaughter of Queen Tamar. Along with Gurji Khatun's tomb, the
sarcophagus of her son, Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad II, was also discovered.
So, with your permission, I am “putting into operation” the
tourist train “Erzurum - Kutaisi” to connect the hometown of David Narin’s
father, where the tomb of his sister, Queen Tamar, is located, and the city
where David Narin was born. But... but for this, the passenger train of the
“Georgian Railways” needs to be technically compatible with the new network
that the Turkish government has planned to create with the help of the “World
Bank”, and the passenger train of the “Turkish Railways” needs to be
technically compatible with the Georgian railway network... All of this
requires a colossal effort, which is far, very far from the thinking,
professionalism, approach, etc. of the current “bosses” of the Georgian railway
sector.
Fundamental changes in the Georgian railways are inevitable!