Main line rail industry news – Page 1155
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News
Investing in Talgo
ON DECEMBER 22 Lehman Brothers Merchant Banking and MCH Private Equity announced investment in a capital increase in Patentes Talgo SA.Purchase of shares from the Oriol family and corporate restructuring will give LBMB a direct and indirect voting equity stake of 49·9%. The transaction is expected to close in the ...
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Holland buy-out
Holland Railconsult staff acquired the majority of the company’s shares in a buy-out effective from January 2.Management and staff now hold 74% of the shares in the Dutch consultancy, and Van Lanschot Bankiers the remaining 26%.On December 15 the Movares Polska subsidiary announced the acquisition of Lublin-based consultancy Biuro Projektów ...
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Door to China
GUANGZHOU Guangri Group and Knorr-Bremse have established a joint venture to produce platform screen doors in China.Knorr-Bremse has a 65% stake in Westinghouse Platform Screen Doors (Guangzhou) Ltd, which will initially employ around 70 staff and produce up to 3000 screen doors annually. The partners have previously won orders to ...
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City News in Brief
Anxious to get rail service to Dulles International Airport as soon as possible, Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority has proposed that it should build the planned 37 km metro extension from West Falls Church, now priced at $3·8bn. The current schedule calls for the 18·6 km first segment to ...
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Sidetrack
Commuter Dave Askwith tried to brighten up his daily journey by putting up official-looking signs providing spoof instructions, warnings and information. He subsequently branched out into road, warning and council signs around Britain’s trains, shops and hotels. ’Some lasted several weeks before being pinched, or taken down by disgruntled staff’, ...
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Intelligence February 2006
Africa: Botswana Railways CEO Andrew Lunga has announced that negotiations are underway with National Railways of Zimbabwe to reinstate the passenger service between Francistown and Bulawayo suspended in 1999. Three return trips would operate each week, with border formalities carried out on the trains. Argentina: The government ...
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Yakutsk accord
DURING a visit to Yakutsk by President Putin on January 6, RZD President Vladimir Yakunin signed a co-operation accord with V Shimokhin, President of the regionally-owned Yakutsk Railway Co, supporting further construction of the Berkakit - Tommot - Yakutsk railway. RZD has already contributed 2m roubles towards the estimated 11m ...
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Nahverkehrs Taschenbuch ’06
INTRO: PublicationsPUBLISHED annually since 1960, the latest edition of this three-volume German-language directory has been updated to November 9 2005. Volume I provides the addresses and lists the senior staff of German passenger and freight operators, related institutions and research centres. Consultants and suppliers are featured in the second volume, ...
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Suburban spring
MUMBAI’S suburban trains are subject to high passenger loadings during the peaks, and coil springs in the primary suspension of the city’s EMU cars have proved unreliable with a short life expectancy.Indian Railways approached Trelleborg and requested a revised suspension design for new-build trains, which could also be retrofitted to ...
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Dry bulk loads
FREIGHT operator EWS and its French-based subsidiary Euro Cargo Rail are offering European users of dry bulk powders and granule products rail transport in ISO-Veyor pressurised containers (RG 9.03 p595).Contained within standard ISO frames, the ISO-Veyor units are filled and sealed at source for intermodal transport to a site, where ...
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Multiple interfaces ease access
RELEASE 4.0 of Spear 3i enterprise asset management software will be launched this year, with features to aid maintenance of moving, fixed and linear assets. The latest update includes a configurable web-accessible ’dashboard’ interface, providing a real-time graphical display of key performance indicators. Mobile Workforce Tablet applications enable staff to ...
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Beijing links
ECI TELECOM announced on January 4 that Beijing Metro had selected its optical transmission equipment to expand video surveillance and safety communication on Lines 1 and 2. The XDM Multi-Service Provisioning Platform will cover 47 stations and around 100 km of track. 'The 2008 Olympics will be a challenging experience, ...
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Independent review
LLOYD’S REGISTER Rail carried out an independent review of Hong Kong MTR’s asset management practices in 2005, after public concern about high-profile incidents.Asset management was assessed through verification of processes and inspection of asset condition, with the international cross-sector BSI PAS 55 asset management standard as a benchmark. Maintenance ...
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Transmission modelling promises a quieter railway
INTRO: Selection of the right trackform for an underground railway has been simplified by the development of a simulation model that accurately predicts the transmission of ground-borne sound and vibration from the rail surface to nearby buildingsBYLINE: Ulrik Danneskiold-Samsøe, Uffe Degn and José Luis Eguiguren*BYLINE: * Ulrik Danneskiold-Samsøe is Marketing ...
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CP embraces best practice
INTRO: Following its transformation from a national railway to a train operator, Comboios do Portugal is looking to play a bigger role on the European stage. President António Ramalho explained to Chris Jackson his plans to develop the business ’WE ARE putting Portugal on the European railway map’, insists António ...
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Unbundling plan could end NRZ ’paralysis’
APPOINTED AS General Manager of National Railways of Zimbabwe on November 1, Mike Karakadzai was charged with ’turning around and possibly restructuring NRZ to make it a viable entity’ (RG 12.05 p760).Six weeks on, the retired Air Commodore announced in mid-December that he had come up with a restructuring package ...
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Premium rail and suspension changes could cut rolling contact fatigue
INTRO: Two methods of achieving economic benefits in the management of rolling contact fatigue were examined in studies carried out by TTCI for the UK railway industry during 2005. Both the use of premium rail steels and changes to vehicle suspensions have the potential to deliver cost savingsBYLINE: Steve Clark, ...
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Major milestones mark ADIF’s first year
INTRO: Administrador de Infraestructuras Ferroviarias started life on January 1 2005 with responsibility for the management of the Spanish national network and the construction of new lines formally assigned to it by the Ministry of Development. Robert Preston asked President Antonio Gonz