Our History

In the 1940s, the leadership of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia laid the foundations of its plans with foresight and firm determination, aiming to achieve economic development and improve the welfare of its citizens.

At that time, the Kingdom was not as we know it today, as it had just begun, step by step, the extraction of oil. This created the need to establish a port on the Arabian Gulf coast, and to provide safe, fast, sustainable, and cost-efficient means of transportation.

The Government of the Kingdom considered establishing a major commercial port to receive the large ships that brought oil drilling equipment, and later to receive oil tankers. The Founder, King Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman Al Saud – may Allah have mercy on him – approved the idea and ordered its immediate implementation. Thus, the railway sector was born, with work commencing in October 1947. A few years later, in October 1951, King Abdulaziz – may Allah have mercy on him – inaugurated the first railway line (Riyadh–Dammam) in a grand ceremony held in Riyadh.

Since then, the Saudi Arabia railway network has expanded between cities, and a number of resolutions were issued to unify all railway lines under one umbrella, with the aim of building an integrated and distinguished transport system, and providing the necessary legislation and enablers to empower the sector to optimally invest in the Kingdom’s strategic location as a hub linking continents, which represents one of the three pillars of Vision 2030.

This path was crowned by the issuance of a Council of Ministers’ resolution in its session on February 16, 2021, abolishing the Saudi Railways Organization and assigning the Saudi Railway Company (SAR) to take over its responsibilities starting April 1, 2021. SAR, which was established in 2006, became the owner and operator of the North Train, and represents the youthful face of the industry and its future arm for achieving sustainability in both passenger and freight transportation.

It is a remarkable success story for the railway sector in the Kingdom, particularly with the networks developed in the past decade — among the largest infrastructure projects in Saudi Arabia — accomplished in record time. Today, SAR stands as the embodiment of this journey, moving forward toward broader horizons both operationally and commercially.