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Yahoo
7 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
NTA: Tel Aviv metro system faces major delays, won't open before 2040
Since the outbreak of the war, foreign firms have become hesitant to operate in Israel — either due to security concerns for their personnel or fear of public backlash. An internal document from NTA, the government company overseeing mass transit in the Tel Aviv area, confirmed the previous report by Walla that the target date of 2034 for opening the metro is no longer realistic. The ongoing war is deterring foreign companies vital to the project from bidding on tenders in Israel, and recruiting foreign workers has also become increasingly difficult. For more stories from ALL ISRAEL NEWS go to A year and a half after Walla revealed that NTA officials estimate that the Tel Aviv metro won't launch before 2040 — six years later than the official target — the company is now preparing to adopt this revised timeline as its official position. The leaked internal document outlines the implications of formally announcing such a delay. This mirrors a move made last year by NTA's CEO, Itamar Ben Meir, who disclosed a 1–3 year delay for the opening of the Green and Purple light rail lines. Delays in major infrastructure projects are not unusual, but public authorities often avoid acknowledging them until the very last moment. This time, NTA is trying to break that pattern. According to the document, in order to meet the original 2034 goal, tenders worth NIS 67 billion (roughly $18 billion USD) for key infrastructure works — including tunnel and station excavation, depot construction, and above-ground street modifications — would need to be issued by 2027. These infrastructure stages are referred to as Infra 1 and 2. Given the scale and complexity of the work, international collaboration is essential, as has been the case with the light rail projects. But since the outbreak of the war, foreign firms have become hesitant to operate in Israel, either due to security concerns for their personnel or fear of public backlash. Even companies already working on light rail expansions in Israel have pulled out foreign staff for extended periods, leading to delays like those seen in Jerusalem's light rail extensions. The document also warns that an official announcement of the delay could complicate land expropriations required for the metro and provoke political fallout, particularly with Transportation Minister Miri Regev. Ironically, some of the delays can be traced back to Regev herself. As an opposition lawmaker, she worked to block the Metro Law (which was eventually passed two years later), and more recently, she has delayed the establishment and staffing of the Metro Authority. She also pushed to postpone approval of the M1 metro line in the Sharon region and demanded its extension to the West Bank. Postponing the metro's launch to 2040 deals a significant blow to efforts to resolve the severe transportation crisis in the Tel Aviv metropolitan area. While the addition of the Green and Purple light rail lines between 2028 and 2030 will finally create a full light rail network in central Israel (alongside the existing Red Line), it will only partially meet demand. That's why the government decided to build a full underground metro system. A congestion charge — expected to cost drivers up to NIS 37 ($10) per day to enter central Tel Aviv by car — is also meant to ease traffic and encourage use of public transportation. However, this too faces opposition from Minister Regev and is progressing mainly due to pressure from the Finance Ministry.
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Nashville's ICE arrests were bad. The lack of information is worse
The more I learn about what happened on the south side of my own hometown, starting in darkness early on May 4, the angrier I become. It's not just that federally driven storm troopers, under the dictates of a broken immigration system, stopped, seized, and 'disappeared' dozens of unnamed, unnumbered people. It's that the lack of information about where they were taken has devastated their families even more. Unhelpful silence in lieu of public explanation from state and federal authorities has only added gross insult to civil law injuries. Tight-lipped state and federal officials have also adopted this arrogant response to any questions: 'The American people voted for this,' referring to the November election. No, we did not. Arrest criminals, yes, but we didn't ask for this. We didn't vote for a dragnet that stops and unnerves innocent family members. Nashville's city officials (chiefly Mayor O'Connell and Metro Law Director Wally Dietz) and a few local news reporters have been doing their best over the past week, asking what exactly happened in the darkness that early Sunday. As yet, no answers or explanations have come from the authorities who directed this. In particular, the elected officials who have so utterly caved to the extreme Trump regime – Governor Bill Lee, US Senators Blackburn and Hagerty, as well as other Republicans in the Legislature and delegation to Congress – have made themselves shamefully scarce. In a saner time, a Tennessee Governor would at least offer helpful information, insisting that the feds and his own Highway Patrol identify who was taken away. But no such wise behavior has come forward a week after ICE's Nashville operations began. Loved ones are left to imagine the worst. Did their family members wake up in another country on the morning of Cinco de Mayo? Who knows? More: Nashville Mayor Freddie O'Connell: Recent ICE arrests caused 'deep community harm' In a saner moment, the US senators who stood by and allowed a stumbling new regime to trash the notion of due process would stand on the same sidewalk where loved ones now grieve these disappearances and insist that details be made public immediately. But those who might know answers aren't telling. And the American officials who could demand the answers aren't. This situation in Nashville, with macho agents in fearsome SWAT gear and dark sunglasses, is downright alarming and scary. Who will be disappeared from our streets next because their skin is brown? 'Racial profiling,' to be clear, is when a sworn official makes a decision to arrest someone based on his or her race or ethnicity, rather than on specific information about criminal activity. It involves using racial stereotypes to target certain groups based on their appearance, on the color of their skin, and, in this case, driving through a particular part of Nashville. Here, a dragnet was cast over an entire part of our city—along the Nolensville Pike corridor—where, in daylight, a commercial and cultural district thrives, adding vibrance to our city. Did this dragnet catch some individuals who are criminals? Maybe. Is that okay? Yes. Were innocent civilians caught up in the same net. Who knows. Racial profiling is an insult to our city and all our families. It is harmful and hurtful to civil society. Loved ones of those taken away were left in fear, to sit and sob on the curb. Eight days later, there is still no word that any of the individuals spirited away were taken before any judge or magistrate and allowed to speak for themselves. The presumption now must be that any 'due process' was utterly ignored. That ought to be downright chilling for all of us as citizens. The truth is that all those 'others'—whom this administration likes to disparage and marginalize—are, in fact, us. If you are not alarmed by what happened here, and how our federal and state officials are failing to do their humane duties about it, you aren't paying enough attention. Keel Hunt, a columnist for the USA Today Network in Tennessee, is the author of four books about Tennessee politics and working on a fifth on the long friendship between Senator Howard Baker and Tennessean publisher John Seigenthaler. Read more at This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: It's time for leaders to demand answers about ICE arrests | Opinion
