Turkmenistan

[Chris]

Turkmenistan is an obscure country in Central Asia, ruled by dictators with grandiose plans for urban development.

Natural gas exploration has allowed this former Soviet backwater to develop large highways, urban boulevards, lined with white marble buildings.



Aşgabat (Turkmenistan) - Highway by Danielzolli, on Flickr


Turkmenistan 0090 by Lex.Harm, on Flickr


Informative Sign by Jamie Kitson, on Flickr


























They opened the new city of Arkadag yesterday. It's west of Ashgabat.

[skluth]

Turkmenistan: the North Korea of Central Asia. At least the highways look well-designed with safety in mind so that they should function decently unlike those of the DPRK where ramps enter and exit freeways with no acceleration/deceleration lanes. This interchange may be my favorite.

[High Voltage]

I'm kind of a nerd for Central Asia and Turkmenistan is the most odd and fascinating country in that region. What's most interesting to me is how empty every road is in every single photo.

[Chris]

I've seen some YouTube travelers going there and they say that these new districts or cities have virtually no people.

Google Earth satellite also shows very little traffic there.

Most people live in much worse conditions than in those marble buildings.

There are also reports that Turkmenistan has far fewer inhabitants than officially reported, potentially only 2.8 million: https://www.rferl.org/a/turkmenistan-population-decline-exodus/31355045.html

[andrepoiy]

Wow. Who took those photos?

[StogieGuy7]

First off, these are fantastic photos of a very hard to capture place. Turkmenistan fascinates me, so any info on it is of great interest to me.

Turkmenistan: the North Korea of Central Asia. At least the highways look well-designed with safety in mind so that they should function decently unlike those of the DPRK where ramps enter and exit freeways with no acceleration/deceleration lanes. This interchange may be my favorite.

Did you check out the condition of the pavement in that satellite photo? It's like an abandoned road, only it's obviously still in use. Totally decrepit, much like the government that maintains it.