According to Marat Zembatov, Director, Center for Interdisciplinary Studies, Institute of State and Municipal Management, Higher School of Economics; Member, Russian-Omani Business Council, Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Russian Federation; Expert, BRICS Business Council Group on Transport and Infrastructure; Ph.D. in Economics:
"While the world held its breath waiting either for US aircraft to approach Iran from the British Isles or for a ceasefire announcement covering the next two weeks — it was the latter that came to pass — Iran's railway network suffered its first serious aerial attack in 39 days of conflict. Officially, eight sections of railway track and associated bridges have been reported as struck. Logistics Insights has endeavored to examine the details.
Where exactly were the strikes aimed? The Yahyaabad railway bridge in the Kashan district of Isfahan Province was hit. Casualties have been reported, regrettably. The area around Kashan railway station was also struck by three air-delivered munitions.
The railway bridge near Aminabad, between Zanjan and Miane, and the Sorkhe Hezar bridge in the city of Rey (Tehran Province) were likewise targeted in the bombardment.
Railway tracks in Karaj, near Tehran, on the Alborz–Zanjan line (to the west of Tehran), and near Kale-Now (to the south of Tehran toward Qom) were also bombed and partially destroyed.
Reports also indicated partial damage to railway branches in the direction of Qazvin and toward Mashhad (to the east of Tehran).
In the absence of official confirmation — let alone any declared rationale for striking railway infrastructure — it is difficult to assess the strategic logic behind these attacks. They may be connected to what was framed as an "ultimatum" from the American side, which explicitly mentioned, among other things, a "day of bridges." There is thus a real possibility that the damage listed above represents the opening strikes in a threatened campaign against transport infrastructure — after which the ceasefire came. Other interpretations, however, remain possible. All strikes hit the railway network in the vicinity of the Iranian capital, Tehran. The majority targeted the western approaches to the city; one strike hit the eastern direction, and two hit the southern axis. An attempt to sever connectivity between the capital and the western provinces may have a more rational logic than it first appears. For instance, these strikes could have been aimed at hampering the rapid movement of resources specifically toward the west and northwest.
In peacetime, this northwestern corridor carried approximately 20 million passengers and 5 million tons of freight per year. This western axis links the capital hub with Karaj, Qazvin, Zanjan, Miane, and Tabriz — and beyond, toward Turkey via northwestern Iran. The industrial profile of the settlements along this route is traditionally heavy. The industrial zones of Qazvin host household chemicals, home appliances, food processing, automotive manufacturing, construction materials, and woodworking. Zanjan is home to metallurgical capacity linked to zinc and copper production, textiles, and electrical equipment manufacturing. Miane is known as one of the country's steel industry centers.
There is another, particularly unwelcome circumstance: the majority of the strikes on Iran's railway infrastructure fell on sections close to the proposed 162-km Rasht–Astara segment — which does not yet exist. The strike on the railway in Qazvin — the closest of the damaged sections to the Rasht–Astara corridor — puts the Qazvin–Rasht line at risk. Until recently, this line carried 2.5 million passengers and 7–7.5 million tons of freight per year. Once extended to Astara, the line had been projected to handle 3.8 million passengers and 10 million tons of freight annually.
The strikes on the southern axis (Yahyaabad and Kashan) disrupt connectivity on the Tehran–Bandar Abbas port line. In peacetime, this route carried 60 million tons of freight and 10.5 million passengers per year. This corridor also links Tehran with major cities in the country's interior — Qom, Kashan, Yazd, and Bafq — before continuing south to the port of Bandar Abbas. In terms of freight composition, port container flows and heavy mineral and metallurgical cargoes are particularly sensitive to any disruption here.
The eastern strike, targeting the Tehran–Mashhad line near Kale-Now, hit the most heavily used passenger corridor in the country. Estimated capacity on this section runs to approximately 15 million passengers and 10 million tons of freight per year. The line also operates branded high-speed services to Mashhad in the east — a major religious, cultural, and economic center with traditionally strong agricultural and industrial sectors. Any loss of rail connectivity on the Tehran–Mashhad line is simply unacceptable.
The most painful consequence of strikes against transport infrastructure must, of course, be considered the loss of functionality of railway bridges. Bridges — particularly given Iran's predominantly single-track network — create bottlenecks even in peacetime. Once bridge traffic is halted, prolonged stoppages across extended sections of the network can be expected. The bridges in question are the Yahyaabad bridge, the Aminabad bridge between Zanjan and Miane, and the Sorkhe Hezar bridge (spanning the river of the same name) in the Tehran area. How long reconstruction might take is difficult to say at this point. If fully destroyed spans over land sections need to be rebuilt, this could well become a matter of weeks.
The long-term economic consequences of halting commercial freight flows are equally impossible to quantify at this stage. What can be stated is that Iran's railway network has temporarily lost functionality in three directions out of Tehran, on limited sections. The greater damage has been inflicted on the northwestern corridor, toward the Turkish border. Whether this points to possible preparation for a US ground operation and efforts to impede the movement of Iranian forces or resources from the capital toward western Iran — particularly in light of yesterday's strikes on Kharg Island and the deployment of the US 142nd Field Artillery Brigade to the Middle East — remains impossible to say. All the more so given that Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif's initiative for a two-week ceasefire appears, by all visible signs and according to official statements from both the Iranian and American sides, to have received a positive response. There is thus hope that ships will soon pass freely through the Strait of Hormuz, that air strikes will cease — at least for a time — and that the steam whistle will not toll for now. And of course, Iran's railway network must be rebuilt."
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