Syria TRANSPORTATION, TELECOMMUNICATIONS, AND CONSTRUCTION
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Figure 12. Transportation System
A portion of the Beirut-damascus highway
Courtesy Murhaf Jouejati
Since antiquity, Syria has served as a major crossroads for
international trade. Syrian merchants traditionally have
prospered from the east-west and north-south movement of goods
and people. In the early twentieth century, Syrian transportation
links continued to be more provincial than national. The
boundaries preceding independence further fragmented the
country's transportation system. Splitting off Lebanon from
Greater Syria (see Glossary) deprived the country of its main
port, Beirut, and placed part of the rail network connecting
Syria's main cities in Lebanon. The French cession of Syria's
northwest corner to Turkey before World War II took away the
country's other port, Iskenderun (Alexandretta), and important
rail and road segments. At independence, the country lacked a
port, adequate links between the main cities of Damascus, Homs,
and Aleppo, and transportation arteries to the important
northeast agricultural area and the fertile coastal plain.
Moreover, the traditional east-west and north-south transit trade
had diminished considerably.
After independence, the state began a major effort to develop
a national transportation system of roads, railroads, and (later)
pipelines. Three ports (Tartus, Latakia, and Baniyas) served
domestic and transit trade. Two international airports (Damascus
and Aleppo) and several secondary airports provided international
and internal connections for freight and passengers. By the mid-
1970s, the main population and economic areas were connected by
the various forms of transport
(see fig. 12, Transportation System).
In 1986 about one-half of the roads, one-half of the
railroads, and two-fifths of port capacity had been added during
the previous 16 years. However, the transportation system
remained overtaxed as a result of the country's development boom
and the increase of transit goods destined for the Gulf states.
Under the Fourth Five-Year Plan, a high level of investment in
transportation infrastructure was planned to remove constraints
on economic development caused by inadequate transportation.
In the mid-1980s, over 95 percent of freight and passenger
traffic moved by truck or bus on the highways. The main arteries
were north-south between the Turkish and Jordanian borders (but
primarily between the major west-central cities of Damascus,
Hamah, Homs, and Aleppo) and north-south along the coastal plain;
east-west traffic also was heavy between the main west-central
cities and towns and the port cities of the coast. Important
corridors, although less heavily used, extended from Damascus
eastward to the border (the primary road to Baghdad), from Homs
eastward to Tadmur for the export of phosphates via the port of
Tartus, and from Aleppo eastward to the important northeast
economic area and continuing to Baghdad.
Major road improvements began in the late 1960s. The paved
highway network had approximately tripled by 1983, reaching
21,000 kilometers or about 90 percent of the highway system. The
state spent LS598 million on road construction in 1984. From 1980
to 1984, major roads grew from 4,527 kilometers to 5,230
kilometers. About 99 percent of the paved roads were two lane,
inadequate for the north-south traffic between the major cities,
towns, and coastal ports. By the late 1970s, overuse of
particular arteries caused congestion, maintenance problems, and
shortened life span of trucks. In the mid-1980s, the government
studied a number of plans to ease congestion in the capital;
plans included construction of a southern ring road, a ring road
along the city wall, and more bridges. The state also continued
plans to upgrade four-lane highways in some heavily populated
western portions of the country and complete a new 104-kilometer
highway to the Jordanian border by 1988. The 1980s also witnessed
an expansion of the rural road network, which grew from 16,290
kilometers in 1980 to 21,796 kilometers in 1984.
After independence, the country developed three major ports.
By 1984 Tartus port, opened in 1965, was the most important,
handling 8.8 million tons of cargo. Tartus handled general cargo
imports, phosphate exports (857,000 tons in 1984) and large
crude-oil exports. Tartus also handled 8,000 passengers. Latakia
port handled general cargo (1.7 million tons in 1984), including
147,000 tons of cotton exports. The government planned to
increase the capacity of Latakia to 3.5 million tons a year in
the late 1980s. Both of these general cargo ports experienced
congestion and unloading delays in the mid-1970s because of the
rapid increase (up to 50 percent between 1974 and 1976) of
seaborne cargo destined for Syria and transit trade to Persian
Gulf countries. Closing of the port of Beirut 1976 as a result of
the Lebanese Civil War temporarily diverted additional transit
cargo to Syrian ports. In the late 1970s, Syrian port congestion
diminished, and waiting time in the 1980s was minimal.
Syria's other port was located at Baniyas, the terminal for
the crude oil pipeline from Iraq. In 1975 crude exports from
Baniyas totaled about 27 million tons, but when export of Iraqi
crude ceased in 1982, activity in Baniyas dropped off
considerably. Completion of the 6-million-ton capacity oil
refinery at Baniyas in 1978 maintained some activity at the oil
port. In 1984 Baniyas exported 1,520 tons of petroleum.
At independence, the country inherited two separate
railroads. The narrow gauge (1.05 meters) Hijaz Railway served
Damascus and the southwest, with connections to Lebanon and
Jordan. In 1984 it had 327 kilometers of track. The standard
gauge (1.4 meters) Northern Railway had 757 kilometers of track
from the port of Latakia to the northeast corner of the country
and Iraq via Aleppo, Ar Raqqah, Dayr az Zawr, and Al Hasakah. The
link between Latakia and the northeast was completed in the mid-
1970s, and it resulted in a substantial rise in freight,
primarily shipments of cotton, wheat, and barley.
By the late 1970s, the railroads required considerable
rehabilitation in order to make an important contribution to the
economy. Transportation policy needed attention and equipment
needed upgrading. The government had long-term plans to add
equipment and trackage, link the two systems, and make the
railroads much more important carriers of passengers and traffic.
In 1978 work began on lines linking the phosphate mines near
Tadmur to Tartus. In 1981 the Soviet Union provided Syria US$49.5
million in development aid, including funding for the 150-
kilometer railroad from Dayr az Zawr to Abu Kamal and an 80-
kilometer line between Tartus and Latakia, with a 10-kilometer
spur to the Tartus cement factory. The 209-kilometer line from
Damascus to Homs opened for freight in 1983. The opening of the
Homs to Tadmur and Homs to Tartus routes, coupled with other
expansions of the railroad network, connected Syria's main towns
and industrial centers in the mid-1980s. By 1984, total standard
extended gauge track stood at 1,686 kilometers.
Syria's civil aviation sector experienced considerable growth
in the 1980s. Syrian Arab Airlines (SAA), the state-owned carrier
established in 1961 as a successor to Syrian Airways, provided
domestic service from Damascus to Aleppo, Latakia, Al Qamishli,
and Dayr az Zawr. SAA's service included thirty-three overseas
routes to major Middle Eastern, European, and South Asian
capitals. In 1986 the airline added biweekly flights to Tehran
and Riyadh. The airline had a total of twenty-three major
transport aircraft.
The General Directorate of Civil Aviation reported a steady
increase in the number of arrivals and departures at Damascus
International Airport, Syria's major air terminal in the 1980s.
The number of passengers rose from 1.3 million in 1983 to 1.5
million in 1984 and 1985, an increase of approximately 16
percent. About 95 percent of Syrian air traffic went via
Damascus, with about 3.3 percent using the Aleppo airport. In
1985 the number of planes arriving at Damascus International
Airport totaled 10,997: 607 arrived at Aleppo and 539 at Dayr az
Zawr. In 1985, freight unloaded at Damascus International Airport
totaled 2.8 tons vs. 2.2 tons loaded.
Not until the 1980's did the country's telecommunications
facilities experience significant growth. The ratio of telephones
to people remained extremely low throughout the 1960s and 1970s,
numbering 13.5 telephones per 1,000 people in 1963 and 17.5
telephones per 1,000 people in 1970. In 1979, Syria embarked upon
a major expansion of the country's telecommunications
infrastructure. The Public Telecommunications Establishment,
Syria's state-owned agency responsible for overseeing and
developing the country's telecommunications, signed a major
contract with a Japanese firm to install two 40,000-line
electronic switching systems in Damascus and Aleppo, a project
that placed Syria's local telephone exchanges among the largest
in the world. By autumn 1983, Syria possessed an improved network
of microwave links and digital systems. In 1983 the number of
telephones per 1,000 people increased to 43 and by 1985 the
country had 512,600 telephones, an increase to 53 telephones per
1,000 inhabitants. Dimashq province accounted for about 40
percent of the country's telephones, followed by Halab province
with 15 percent, and then by Hims, Hamah, and Al Ladhaqiyah
provinces.
In the late 1980s, Syria's international links depended on
its participation in the International Telecommunications
Satellite Organization (INTELSAT), a coaxial cable to Crete and
radio relay to neighboring countries. Furthermore, plans to link
Syria with the Soviet-sponsored Intersputnik network and the
regional Arab Satellite Organization (ARABSAT) system would
significantly contribute to Syria's telecommunications
capabilities, as would the new telecommunications network slated
to link Damascus, Sheikh Meskin, and Dar'a in Syria with towns in
Jordan and Saudi Arabia in the 1990s.
Radio-broadcast transmissions were made from six AM stations
for domestic service and from a high-frequency station located at
Sabburah for international service. Television is broadcast from
13 transmitters, including a 350-kilowatt transmitter which
broadcasts into Israel, and 27 low-power relay stations.
In the mid-1970s, construction became a major growth sector
of the economy and, because it is labor intensive, an important
employer, particularly of unskilled labor. The construction
industry helped absorb the large flow of agricultural workers who
moved to urban areas seeking a better living. Construction
expanded an average of 8.2 percent a year (in constant prices)
between 1953 and 1976, but there were great variations in growth.
From 1977 to 1984, construction expanded a total of 160 percent.
The sector expanded in terms of value added (at constant prices)
by nearly 20 percent a year between 1970 and 1976. Between 1978
and 1984 the sector expanded 7.5 percent a year in terms of value
added at constant prices.
Housing construction had fallen considerably behind the needs
of the population in the mid-1970s. From 1975 to 1978, the number
of residential building licenses issued by the government grew
from 12,388 to 22,626, but in 1984 the state issued only 14,666
new residential building licenses--a signal that the mid-1970s
construction boom was winding down. The high rate of population
increase, the rural to urban migration, and the desire of Syrians
to invest in secure areas like housing put severe pressures on
housing and services such as water, sewerage, electricity, and
telephones in most cities and towns. Figures to measure the
housing shortages were lacking in 1987, but soaring real estate
prices in the major cities in the 1980s confirmed the shortage.
Those with limited incomes and young couples experienced
particular difficulties as a result of sharply rising land and
construction costs that priced moderate wage earners out of the
market. By 1986 government efforts to curb urban land speculation
and to ease the supply of building material had had only limited
success. The average price of ordinary apartments in Damascus
topped LS1 million in the mid-1980s, with little hope for relief.
Data as of April 1987
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