Railways have an underpinning and pivotal role as a medium of transportation and, by extension, socio-economic development because it is cheap and safe and helps to ease traffic congestion on the roads. And in today’s world of high-priced fuels, railways significantly reduce the cost of transporting goods and commuters. It is therefore, a logical and inevitable outcome that most countries are seeking to expand, modernise and improve the efficiency and reliability of their railways.
Amol Agrawal points out in his article, “The importance of railways in urban economics and society development”:  “More than any other technical design or social institution, the railway stands for modernity. No competing form of transport, no subsequent technological innovation, no other industry has wrought or facilitated change on the scale that has been brought about by the invention and adoption of the railway.”

Peter Laslett once referred to “the world we have lost”—the unimaginably different character of  things, as they once were. Try to think of a world before the railway and the meaning of distance and the impediment it imposed when the time it took to travel from, for example, Paris to Rome—and the means employed to do so—had changed little for two millennia. Think of the limits placed on economic activity and human life chances by the impossibility of moving food, goods, and people in large numbers or at any speed in excess of ten miles per hour; of the enduringly local nature of all knowledge, whether cultural, social, or political, and the consequences of such compartmentalization.”

Elena Ilie in an article, ‘The railway infrastructure enhances economic development noted’,  that:  “In recent years, the governments’ agenda in Central and Eastern Europe, Central Asia and the Caucasus region, which define the Wider Black Sea Area, focused mainly on various programmes for railway infrastructure capacity development. Modern governments play a pro-active role in the day-to-day management of their economies. To that effect, one of the economic objectives is to implement an active policy in order to ensure a proper transport infrastructure which, in its turn, will ensure and support the social and economic requirements of a country. Hence, the railway infrastructure could be divided into two categories: productive infrastructure and social infrastructure.”
So it is clear that railways are almost indispensable in the development process. However, while all others are hustling to expand and modernise their railways, ours was scrapped by the former PNC government. Needless to say, our country was the first in South America to have railways.

It was perhaps the single biggest mistake made by the PNC government and it has cost this country so much, not least of which is the traffic congestion and the spate of traffic accidents.

The then Deputy Prime Minister Dr Ptlolemy Reid later went to the National Assembly and admitted it was a mistake to scrap the railways but the damage had already been done and this country continues to suffer from that dreadful mistake which many conveniently forget.

However, there have been some recent exciting prospects with the possibility of the reintroduction of railways as President Bharrat Jagdeo hinted at this at a recent ‘One Stop Shop’ exercise. And in our yesterday’s edition, we reported that a team of consultants from ‘Good Earth Development’ met President  Jagdeo to facilitate discussions for coalition among Guyanese engineers and financiers to connect a railway between Boa Vista in Brazil and Guyana’s capital, Georgetown.

The Good Earth Development officials included Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Mr. Mark Chatarpal, Gregory Shaw and other clients who held talks with the Guyanese Head of State at the Office of the President. The company is soon to have a Guyana office.

Chatarpal told the Government Information Agency (GINA) that the rapid growth in Guyana’s economy and its geographic position to Brazil and South America have been the motivation behind the concept.

“There is a growing urgency from the business community in Guyana as well as in Brazil to facilitate some sort of interconnectivity between the two countries to make this a possibility,” Chaterpal said.

It will therefore be hoped that this initiative would fructify since  it would definitely contribute to unlocking the massive potential of trade and tourism  between the two countries.