Coastal Railway). In 1958, a westbound freight-only spur was built from the Yarkon railway into the Kiryat Arye industrial zone. After service on the Eastern Railway between Hadera and Kfar Saba was discontinued in 1969, the Yarkon Railway became part of the national main line linking Haifa via Herzliya, Petah Tikva, Rosh HaAyin and Lod to Jerusalem and the south of Israel. When the Ayalon Railway opened in the 1990s as a more direct connection between the Coastal Railway and Lod (running through Tel Aviv, unlike via the Yarkon and Eastern railways which bypassed the city), passenger service on the Yarkon Railway ceased completely. In 1999 it was decided to reinstate passenger service on the Yarkon railway in order to operate a new suburban line to the northern Gush Dan region; as a preparation for this, the old railway station in Petah Tikva and the spur line leading to it were dismantled, and the new Petah Tikva Segula railway station constructed instead. The new service between Tel Aviv and Rosh HaAyin opened on 3 June 2000. In 2003, this service was extended into Hod HaSharon via the Eastern Railway and the new Sharon Railway; for this, a new connection between the Yarkon Railway and Eastern Railway was built, which avoided the reversal at Rosh HaAyin. The old Rosh HaAyin South railway station thus remained inaccessible to the extended service, and the new Rosh HaAyin North railway station opened on 13 September 2003 at a location about 2 km north of the old one. The newest station on the Yarkon Railway, Petah Tikva Kiryat Aryeh, opened on 3 May 2008. There are future plans to build a new railway station in the vicinity of Petah Tikva central bus station, to allow a convenient passenger connection to Tel Aviv Light Rail. Between 2003 and 2012, the entirety of the Yarkon Railway was converted to double track. In 2021 the railway underwent electrification. References Standard gauge railways in Israel