The holy travelers!
There’s no place on the face of this universe that hosts such a big number of visitors like Makkah Mukarramah and Madinah Munawwarah do. People don’t visit these places for entertainment purposes or for fun but only for the fulfillment of their religious rituals. Muslims from all over the world visit these two cities the whole year except three Islamic months when the authorities take some rest and development works goes at its full potential. This is the only time in the year when no outside visitors can visit for the purpose of performing religious activities.
Services by authorities:
The authorities in Saudi Arabia make sure that not a single visitor faces any problems. All the time development works go on and work is being done on different projects. As hundreds of thousands of people frequently move between three cities, Makkah, Madinah and Jeddah, transportation has always been a big hurdle as well. But the strategy and planning by the authorities has solved this problem easily. They allow private car owners to carry passengers to and fro these cities. In the meanwhile big train and road projects are going on.
Recently the Saudi government has started a rail project which is known as metro and it helps pilgrims move between Mina and Makkah during Hajj season. Normally in Hajj season transportation is the biggest challenge. Because almost 4 million Muslims leave together for Mina when the Hajj starts and then they travel to and from Makkah gradually.
In Mina and Arafat, where almost 4 million people gather for religious activities, free food and drinks are distributed by government authorities as well as private organizers. Government makes sure that all the facilities, including latrines, first aid, hospitals and refreshment are available easily to each and every pilgrim.
Response to accommodation challenge
Recently, a large number of hotels have been demolished and new projects have been launched simultaneously. This definitely has given rise to a shortage of hotels and visitors are facing some problems. But this is only for a time being. It is expected to take 5 years more before new hotels will be constructed and this problem is likely to be solved. But once it’s done, it is expected that there’ll be no need for a similar plan for the next fifteen to twenty years.
Hotels are usually very expensive in Makkah because of visitors’ tendency towards Makkah. In Madina hotels are not too expensive. The reason is that the number of visitors is comparatively less than what they are in Makkah. The other reason is the timely completion of projects in Madina.