All Railway Gazette International articles in July 2005
All articles published this month.
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News
Sidetrack
A small problem solvedATJUST 128 cm tall, Melbourne resident Bruce ’Giant’ Chaplin has a problem when boarding the city’s trams; he can’t reach the coin slots on ticket machines. While he can usually find a fellow passenger to drop his coins in the slot for him, this isn’t always possible. ...
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News
Sheltam stake
SOUTH African logistics firm Grindrod has acquired a 50% stake in Sheltam Locomotive & Railway Services, it announced on May 12. Port Elizabeth-based Sheltam owns a fleet of locos and an air charter business.Grindrod’s Landfreight Director Laurence Stuart-Hill said ’the acquisition of a 50% stake in Sheltam not only provided ...
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News
Service subsidiaries
LEIPZIG Transport and Siemens have combined their Leipziger Fahrzeugservice-Betriebe and Leipziger Infrastruktur Betriebe subsidiaries to form IFTEC GmbH.IFTEC provides track and rolling stock maintenance and consulting, with Leipzig Transport accounting for 89% of its business. ’Collaboration with private companies has always been a component of LVB’s corporate strategy’, said Chairman ...
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News
Reform on track
PLANS are on course for conversion of Pakistan Railways to a corporation at the end of July, Railways Minister Mian Shamim Haider announced on June 20.The minister said the plans were awaiting approval by the federal cabinet. The Railways Board is to be abolished and a new Chief Executive will ...
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News
Publications
Urban Transit: Operations, Planning & Economics By Vukan R Vuchic 'Transportation, being one of the basic functions in urbanised areas, influences the form of cities and their liveability', says Prof Vukan Vuchic in his introduction. Experience has shown that public transport contributes 'greatly to the quality of life.' ...
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News
A small problem solved
ATJUST 128 cm tall, Melbourne resident Bruce ’Giant’ Chaplin has a problem when boarding the city’s trams; he can’t reach the coin slots on ticket machines. While he can usually find a fellow passenger to drop his coins in the slot for him, this isn’t always possible. On a recent ...
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News
Pointers
Bolivia’s Mines & Metallurgy Ministry says that bids will be called this year for construction of a 100 km rail link between iron ore deposits at Mutún and a proposed port at Puerto Busch on the Paraguay River. Argentinian competition authority CNDC is considering the proposed acquisition by Camargo Corrêa ...
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News
‘Reasonable’ performance
HOLLAND Railconsult Holding described its performance in 2004 as ’extremely reasonable’. Turnover in the Netherlands was better than expected, but profits of €3m were slightly down on 2004, and international results were ’somewhat less positive than had been hoped.’Operating income for the year was €134m, down from €136m in 2003. ...
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News
Tactile path
JAPAN’S Railway Technical Research Institute has carried out testing with blind passengers to develop a national standard for the installation of tactile paving which provides a warning of platform edges. In an effort to reduce the risk of passengers falling from platforms, researchers have identified the optimal width of tactile ...
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News
Tren Urbano opens
JUNE 6 saw the start of revenue services on the 17·7 km Tren Urbano metro line in San Juan, Puerto Rico, which links the western suburbs of Bayamon and Guaynabo with Santurce, serving 16 stations. Construction began in 1996, and the line was scheduled to open on July 1 2001. ...
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News
Taking notes
ANALYSIS of the reliability of over 300 London Underground ticket machines maintained by Cubic Transportation Systems found that 15% of the Giesecke & Devrient BIM2020 bank note identification modules were causing half of all malfunctions, and so needed upgrading.To ensure reliability, 50 modules containing older BIM1000 sensors have been replaced ...
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News
Metros
Canada: Following rejection of an appeal against the environmental study, Toronto Transit Commission is due to begin work next month on the C$65m St Clair Avenue West Transit Improvement Project to rebuild 6·5 km of street tramway on reserved track. China: Boring of two 4·7 km tunnels was completed on ...
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News
Market
Australia: The Thiess Hochtief joint venture has awarded iQR and BT Contractors an A$20m contract to lay 26·2 km of slab track and construct emergency walkways on the Epping to Chatswood line in Sydney (RG 6.03 p371) by August 2006.Bulgaria: On June 11 Siemens and BDZ signed a €117m contract ...
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News
Point machine put to the test
WESTINGHOUSE has begun a year-long field trial of its Surelock points drive machine at Stratford Market depot on London Underground’s Jubilee Line. PPP contractor Tube Lines plans to use Surelock in the resignalling of Stanmore station during 2006.According to Westinghouse, Surelock has a mean time between failures of 30 months ...
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News
Port line started
VIETNAM Railways announced on June 1 that work had started on the creation of a 130 km rail link from Hanoi to the new deep-water port at Cai Lan.Expected to cost 4bn dong, the project involves the reconstruction of DSVN’s residual standard-gauge line from Kep to Ha Long, together with ...
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News
Kirkuk stations revived
KIRKUK and Al Maraei stations in Iraq have been rehabilitated, and work is underway at Al Thawra and Al Reyadh for completion later this year. A further 11 stations in Ninewa goverornate are to be reconstructed.Rubbish has been removed and unsafe structures demolished at the two stations over four months ...
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News
Intelligence
Australia: Toll opened an A$20m freight terminal at Townsville in early May. A joint venture of Toll and Pacific National began running 1067mm gauge freight services from Brisbane to Cairns in March.Brazil: Portugese construction firm Somague Engenharia has completed a feasibility study for a US$570m rail link between São Paulo ...
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News
IJtram inaugurated
ON MAY 28 an 8·5 km extension of the Amsterdam tram network was inaugurated by Transport Minister Karla Peijs. Known as IJtram, the line provides a connection between Amsterdam Centraal station and a new housing estate taking shape on the east side of the city.Being built on six artificial islands ...
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News
Guangzhou rebuild
WORK began in May on a 100m yuan project to double the daily passenger capacity of Guangzhou’s main station.By October the current 9000m2 of waiting areas will have been increased to 14000m2.. Two additional waiting rooms are to be built, giving a total of 11 separate facilities.The station was designed ...