Abbas Rezaei expects the railroad to come on stream by the end of President Hassan Rouhani’s tenure (August 2021), the news portal of Iran Chamber of Commerce, Industries, Mines and Agriculture reported.

Iran is in contract with China Railway Group Limited, also known as CREC, to build this railroad project. Although the contract was signed in 2015 with an estimated value of €1.8 billion, its scope and value are expected to expand.

Former roads minister, Abbas Akhoundi, ordered, at the time, the redesign of the route to make it more efficient compared to the previous design, including the relocation of train stations in Tehran, Qom and Isfahan, Financial Tribune reported.

CREC is a Chinese construction company listed in Shanghai and Hong Kong stock exchanges. The major shareholder of the company is the state-owned China Railway Engineering Corporation.

By revenue, CREC was the largest construction company in the world in the 2015 Engineering News-Record "Top 225 Global Contractors".