A JOINT venture of Foster + Partners and Buro Happold has won a contract to design four stations along a new high-speed railway line in Saudi Arabia, which will link the cities of Makkah and Madinah via Jeddah.

Running a length of 444 km, the Haramain High-speed Railway (HHR) will pass via Jeddah and the King Abdullah Economic City. The new service will be operated by state-of-the-art, high-speed trains, capable of reaching speeds of up to 300 kmph.
Al Rajhi Alliance has a SR6.79-billion ($1.81 billion) contract to implement the Phase One Package One of the project. The first phase, which runs for three years, includes preparing the ground and constructing bridges, culverts and tunnels for laying track. The Al Rajhi Alliance is led by Mada Group, and includes Bouygues, Al Arrab Contracting, Arup and China Railway Engineering Corporation.
The project would be completed by the middle of 2012 and pilot operations on the track would be conducted for a period of six months until its official launch in November the same year.
The second phase will include, track-laying, electrification, power supply, installing communication and signalling systems and deploying rolling stock.
Alstom, the French maker of TGV trains, will bid for the locomotives tender. A tender for the five train stations will take place in the third or fourth quarter this year.
The stations at Makkah, Jeddah Central, Jeddah Airport, King Abdullah Economic City and Madinah Knowledge Economic City will be built under Package Two, which is also expected to run for three years.