The awarding of the Tel Aviv light rail tender to the MTS group, headed by Africa Israel, ostensibly heralds a new age of transportation. In practice, the company faces many obstacles. Above all, it will have to prove - possibly in court - that the massive tunneling that its construction method entails will not damage groundwater resources. Afterward, it will have to cope with the planning agencies of five different local authorities and the challenges of funding a complex project. At the same time, it will be forced to prove that its passenger cars are suitable. Construction will take several years, during which time the region's main traffic arteries will be adversely affected.

Despite these difficulties, we welcome the fact that the plan for the mass transit project has finally been launched. The plan, which began when Golda Meir was prime minister, was revived and given priority during Yitzhak Rabin's term and was shepherded through the advanced planning stages by then finance minister Avraham Shochat.

The plan, which was developed by Metropolitan Mass Transit System (NTA), formerly the Tel Aviv Rail Administration, presents a much greater challenge. At first, there was talk of building a subway similar to those operating in cities around the world. The advantages of this type of system include unlimited right of way (underground routes that avoid above-ground traffic signals, jams and other vehicles), large passenger capacity (due to size, speed, closely-spaced stations and high frequency of travel), and minimum environmental impact.

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After Rabin's murder in 1995 and the political changes it engendered, all successive Israeli governments have been wary of spending the enormous amount required to build a subway. Africa Israel is now taking on a patchwork, compromise project: a train that will run only partially underground - and, unusually, not in the city center but rather in intercity stretches. Most of the train's route will be on the surface, where it will not have the benefits of speed, high capacity or the right of way.

For now, only the project's Red Line, connecting Petah Tikva, Bnei Brak, Ramat Gan and Jaffa-Tel Aviv, to Bat Yam, has been approved. This will reduce road traffic but is not part of the future traffic network (which remains undefined) and does not offer a solution to transport in the center of Tel Aviv.

An effective transit system is critical in Tel Aviv, to open up the traffic blockages that exact a high economic price in Israel's urban center. Following the impressive development of Israel Railways, ridership has increased from 4 million to 20 million passengers a year in the past eight years. Car owners have willingly left their cars behind. It is not too late for Tel Aviv. There is still time to consider building a subway, and to plan a multi-branch underground system whose speed and convenience will encourage more people to give up their cars within the city as well. The underground rail system could still change from being merely a means of transport into the agent of historic, transportational and economic change.