Algiers–Tamanrasset by Train: The Railway That Crosses the Sahara

Moussa Mahamat — N’Djamena, Tchad — 2026-09-06

Nearly 2,400 kilometers of track to link Algiers to Tamanrasset across the Atlas and the Sahara — a megaproject the Algerian press calls "the project of the century", and which is finally entering its active phase. Algeria, which today counts around 5,000 kilometers of rail network, wants to triple it to 15,000 kilometers by 2030 — a comprehensive program estimated at more than $20 billion in investment.

The commitments, for their part, are already signed and quantified. The African Development Bank approved an initial financing of €747 million for the first tranche of the Laghouat–Ghardaïa–El Meniaa line — the northern foundation of the Algiers–Tamanrasset project — followed by a second loan of $878 million for the second phase of the same section. Studies for this section are 100% complete, and President Tebboune has set the goal: commissioning in 2028.

This railway does not only carry passengers: it carries a vision. Heading down to Tamanrasset means linking the Mediterranean to the heart of the Sahara, opening the doors of trade to the Sahel and the Gulf of Guinea, opening up territories the size of entire countries. It is also, for the ore of the south and the harvests of the Sahara, the difference between buried wealth and exported wealth. Algeria is moreover devoting $4 billion to the acquisition of new trains — it is not laying tracks just to watch them go by.

For the investor, the message is plain: Africa's largest railway project is financed by multilateral institutions, steered by a state that meets its deadlines, and open to partners — the tender for the southern section is estimated at around $2.5 billion. For the Sahel, the lesson is simple: while some countries dig ditches, Algeria lays rails. Both strategies exist. Only one connects peoples.