Ho Chi Minh City's metro line named among world's greatest places in 2025
VGP - TIME magazine has listed the metro line in Ho Chi Minh City in a list of world's greatest places for 2025.
Twelve years after construction began, the first-ever metro line in Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam's largest metropolis opened in December last year. The arrival of mass rapid transit is an achievement for a megapolis famous for its motorbike-choked roads. The city of 9 million has more than 7 million motorbikes.
The US$1.7 billion project, largely financed by loans from Japan, was initially greenlit in 2007 with a US$668 million budget and an opening planned for 2018, but ballooning costs and funding shortages led to numerous delays.
The 12.2-mile line runs from historic Ben Thanh Market, in the heart of Ho Chi Minh City, to the sub-city of Thu Duc in the northeast, with 14 stops.
"It promises to ease congestion and pollution in the country's commercial capital, where the population has almost doubled in the last two decades. Now travelers can bypass whizzing motorbikes and gridlocked streets to reach popular tourist sites such as the French colonial Saigon Opera House, Nguyen Hue pedestrian boulevard, and bustling backpacker/nightlife thoroughfare Bui Vien," TIME editors wrote.
The long slog it took to reach this new era of public transit hasn't deterred the government's optimism: in December it announced the goal of six additional lines before 2035.
The team of editors at the New York-based news magazine selected remarkable destinations and thrilling new experiences travelers need to know about. Now in its seventh year, the list highlights everything from resorts to cruises to museums, restaurants and national parks./.
