Qalibaf and Ahmadi-nejad are long-time political rivals. They ran against each other in the presidential race in 2005. Both are from the conservative faction, but Qalibaf appears to chafe at Ahmadi-nejad’s flamboyance.
The Institute for Transportation and Development Policy is a private, non-governmental organization based in New York City. It works with cities worldwide to bring about what it calls sustainable transport solutions that cut greenhouse gas emissions, reduce poverty, and improve the quality of urban life.
The institute nominated five cities as candidates for its 2011 Sustainable Transport Award. The five were: Tehran, Iran; Lima Peru; Nantes, France; Guangzhou, China; and Leon, Guanajuato, Mexico. At the dinner Monday night in Washington, Guangzhou won the award.
The mayors of the five cities were invited to the dinner. Qalibaf was reportedly preparing to go, but the daily Tehran-e Emruz said the Foreign Ministry denied him permission.
The newspaper said, “It is not clear why the trip,… which was in line with the policy of touting Iranian achievements and showing the efficiency of Iranian management, was treated in such an unkind manner and has been the victim of political considerations.”
The reference to “political considerations” was a polite reference to the widespread assumption that the Ahmadi-nejad Administration did not wish to see Qalibaf in photos being praised by American transportation experts.
The president and the mayor have been tussling over transportation for more than a year. The Majlis approved more than a billion dollars in state funds to speed up work on the Tehran Metro. Ahmadi-nejad, however, has not released the funds to the Metro management. It is widely assumed he does not do so because the mayor is a rival and the Metro chief, Mehdi Hashemi, is the son of another rival, former President Ali-Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani.
Qalibaf acknowledged that he could not go to the United States, but chose not to make an issue of it. “It is not important whether I go or not to this ceremony,” he told the Mehr news agency. “What is important is the work that has been completed that means we now compete with the large and industrial cities of the world.”
The institute pushes non-auto transport systems, such as subways, bike rack rentals and especially bus rapid transport (BRT). BRT is a system where buses operate in dedicated lanes and thus move more quickly than buses competing with normal traffic. Leon, the Mexican city nominated for the award, is the locale that created the first BRT.
In its write-up about Tehran, the Institute said the following:
“Iran’s capital city Tehran, with a population 8 million, stands out as a model city in the region for its aggressive policy to expand and implement new mass transit options. The city has developed a comprehensive public transport policy.…
“In addition to its urban rail system, Tehran has been implementing bus rapid transit as a complement to the public transit network beginning in 2007.…
“In 2010, the city debuted an integrated electronic fare system for the Metro and public bus services. It is beginning now to be implemented in the private buses.”