Main line rail industry news – Page 1227
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Relentless progress to meet the deadlines
BYLINE: Ad van den DoolStrukton Railinfra bvStrukton Railinfra faces the challenge of laying 140 km of track and installing 220 km of overhead wires on the Betuwe Route in one year. After a selection process involving nine prequalified contracting consortia from various European countries, the contract for the trackwork and ...
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Leader will improve train handling
DRIVERS can be informed of the most efficient train handling techniques to achieve the best fuel economy and fastest journey times using Leader, which is undergoing testing by Norfolk Southern. The Locomotive Engineer Assist/Display & Event Recorder was developed by New York Air Brake Corp, and has been fitted to ...
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Controversy dogs freight corridor
INTRO: Cost over-runs and political problems have conspired to delay the completion of the Betuwe Route, and questions are being asked about its viabilitysupply network. ProRail also awarded a €75m contract to Holland Railconsult and Alstom in the same month for the ETCS Level 2 train control system. Also in ...
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Pre-assembled turnouts cut installation times
BYLINE: Dr Peter Schulz and Chris van Dranen*INTRO: TURNOUTSfor the Betuwe Route are being supplied by BWG of Germany, working with its Dutch sister company WBN Wisselbouw. In 2000 WBN Wisselbouw supplied the turnouts used below the hump to the sorting sidings in the marshalling yard at Kijfhoek south of ...
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Sacramento expansion at risk
NEW Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced at the end of November that he planned to cut funding for 140 transport projects across California in a bid to reduce the state’s budget deficit. Among the schemes at risk is the $66m second phase of Sacramento Regional Transit District’s South Corridor light rail ...
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Interstate lease releases upgrading funds
NEW SOUTH WALES Transport Minister Michael Costa told around 650 delegates to the AusRail Plus 2003 event in Sydney on November 17 that the state’s rail unions were ’95% of the way’ to agreeing to the lease of interstate track in New South Wales to Australia Rail Track Corp. And ...
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Cross-city link takes shape
Antwerpen's north-south junction will provide a direct connection for both conventional and high speed services to the north of the city
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Halting market share decline is biggest challenge in the East
WITH ACCESSION to the European Union top of the agenda in Eastern Europe, delegates to Terrapinn’s Central & East European Rail 2003 summit in Budapest on November 27-29 were warned not to make the same mistakes as railways in Western Europe. Jean-Arnold Vinois, Head of the Railway Transport & Interoperability ...
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Understanding of RCF advances
THERE IS now a far greater understanding of rolling contact fatigue in the UK than there was on October 17 2000 when the Hatfield derailment occurred. In part this is due to the Wheel-Rail Interface System Authority, set up in 2001 to co-ordinate the response to RCF by a shattered ...
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Chinese initiative
THREE German companies and Guangzhou Railway Group signed an agreement on December 2 to create a ’German high speed initiative’ in the Chinese city.Turnout maker BWG, track supplier Pfleiderer and Siemens will assist local rail operators, and the high speed initiative will support the development of a 127 km inter-city ...
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Wheel/Rail Safety
Edited by Professor Roger LundénTHIS October 2003 special edition (Volume 26, Number 10) of the monthly journal Fatigue & Fracture of Engineering Materials & Structure contains 15 articles on research into the wheel-rail interface, with a particular emphasis on the rail. Three introductory articles provide an overview of rail defects, ...
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Intermodal boost
CANADIAN Pacific Railway announced on November 20 a major upgrading of its intermodal services between Montréal, Chicago, and Vancouver. A new fleet of 5500 double-stack wagons and lengthening of 18 passing loops in northern Ontario will allow CPR to carry 28% more containers on 16% fewer trains.Addition of remote-controlled mid-train ...
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Ferry link launched
CONSTRUCTION work has started for the planned Bohai Sea train ferry linking China’s Shandong and Liaoning provinces (RG 6.02 p285). Being developed at an estimated cost of 2·35bn yuan, the ferry service is expected to start in June 2006.The 147 km sea route between Yantai and Dalian will save up ...
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Nordharz contract
ON DECEMBER 9 Sachsen-Anhalt Transport Minister Karl-Heinz Daehre announced that the Land subsidiary Nahverkehrsservice Sachsen-Anhalt GmbH had selected Connex Regiobahn GmbH for a 12-year concession to operate regional services on the Nordharz network. The company will take over from DB Regio’s Südost business unit in December 2005. The Nordharz concession ...
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CN wins BC Rail concession
ON NOVEMBER 25 the government of British Columbia announced that it had selected Canadian National Railway for a 60-year concession to operate the 2315 km BC Rail network. Premier Gordon Campbell said CN would pay C$1bn over the life of the concession. Half of this will be used to retire ...
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Java doubling
INDONESIAN President Megawati Soekarnoputri participated in celebrations at Cikampek on December 4 to inaugurate double track on a key section of the Javan north coast main line running east from Jakarta. According to Communications Minister Agum Gumelar, doubling the 135 km from Cikampek to Cirebon will raise capacity from 145 ...
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High speed trials and tenders
THE FIRST Class 104 trainsets ordered by Spanish National Railways for high speed regional services (RG 7.03 p415) left the Alstom works at Santa Perpètua de Mogoda near Barcelona at the end of November, bound for La Sagra depot near Toledo and dynamic trials on the Madrid - Sevilla route. ...
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JFK Airtrain opens
DECEMBER 17 saw the formal opening of the 13 km automated peoplemover network serving JFK International Airport. The date had been selected to mark the centenary of the Wright Brothers’ first flight. Airtrain provides a link between the various airline terminals, together with external connections to Howard Beach subway station ...
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Financial advisers named
SAUDI Railways Organisation President Khalid H Alyahya announced at the Mena Rail conference staged by IIR in Dubai on December 9 that financial advisers had been appointed for Saudi Arabia’s planned rail expansion projects.UBS of Switzerland and the National Commercial Bank of Saudi Arabia have been chosen to handle the ...
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Five make Subte Line A bidding
FROM A FIELD OF nine prequalified bidders, metro construction authority Subterr