The high-speed rail line between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem currently being built will open for service in 2018, Israel Railways CEO Boaz Tzafrir promised on Monday to a group of Knesset members who were touring the ongoing construction work. Travel time between Tel Aviv's Haganah station and Jerusalem's International Convention Center station will be half an hour. Service frequency will be four trains per hour in each direction. Trains will make an intermediary stop at Ben-Gurion International Airport. The maximum speed on the new line will be 160 kilometers (99 miles) per hour. Tzafrir said the total cost of the project will reach 7 billion shekels ($1.82 billion). The project has required the construction of six tunnels and eight bridges along the course of the line. It currently takes around an hour and 15 minutes to travel between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem by train on the old line built during the Ottoman era in the late 19th century. And the current station in Jerusalem is inconveniently located in the Malha neighborhood, on the southwestern outskirts of Jerusalem.
