Existing railways in Guinea are badly maintained and feeble, and would need to be rebuilt from the ground up to support a tenfold or hundredfold increase in tonneages.
The existence of successful heavy duty narrow gauge lines in South Africa, Queensland and Brazil would not affect this choice.
It connects new mining areas at Santou II and Houda with a new river port at Dapilon near Yakabya, around 25km west of Boké[2] The line is operated by the SMB-Winning Consortium and is intended to carry predominantly bauxite.
Dapilon port has been criticised for the effects of bauxite dust causing environmental damage to fields, cashew plantations and nearby settlements.
[4] A description of the project, including map, funding and future ownership arrangements is provided on the WCS website [5] and in a Rio Tinto press release [6] The planned new line roughly parallels Guinea's southern border with Sierra Leone and Liberia.