Line 5 — Riyadh Metro (Green)

Line 5 (Green) is the shortest line on the Riyadh Metro and the most concentrated: 12.9 km (8 mi) and 12 stations, almost all of it in tunnel under King Abdulaziz Road, from Ministry of Education in the north to National Museum in the south. Short as it is, it is one of the most useful lines on the network, because it runs directly beneath the ministries quarter and the institutions around it — King Salman Park, As Sulimaniyah, Ad Dhabab, Abu Dhabi Square, Officers Club, GOSI, Al Wizarat, Ministry of Defense, King Abdulaziz Hospital and Ministry of Finance — ending at National Museum beside the King Abdulaziz Historical Centre. This is the line of civil servants and of people with appointments, and its peaks fall in office hours rather than at the weekend. With roughly one station per kilometre it behaves like a dense inner-city line rather than a long-distance one. Both of its ends plug into the rest of the network: Ministry of Education joins Line 2 running east and west, National Museum joins Line 1 running north and south, so no point in Riyadh is more than one change from the ministries. Eleven of the twelve stations are in deep tunnel and only the terminus at Ministry of Education comes up to the surface — an engineering choice forced by the density of building and the sensitive sites the line passes beneath, and one that spares passengers the Riyadh summer.