Main line rail industry news – Page 1306
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News
Transrapid deal struck
HAVING HAWKED its magnetic levitation technology around the world for 20 years, Transrapid has finally found a buyer. A contract was signed on January 23 between Transrapid International and a consortium led by Shanghai City Council for a 30 km maglev line from Longyang Road in the southeast suburbs of ...
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Istanbul invests in rail
TURKEY: Eight metro, light rail and tram projects have been included in Istanbul municipality's 2001 capital investment budget, which was unveiled in mid-December. Total expenditure on rail schemes is put at 4000bn lire. The largest proportion of the money is allocated for construction of new suburban rail corridors feeding into ...
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News‘The situation in Holland is critical’
Seven years after the separation of infrastructure and operations, the punctuality on Netherlands Railways hit a post-1995 low, fuelled by labour and rolling stock shortages. Chris Jackson spoke to NS and the ministry of transport about their recently-agreed five-year recovery plan, which provides for a 23% growth in passenger traffic. New legislation will see the formation of a state-owned infrastructure management company and the award of long-term operating concessions, in a bid to restore quality and support high levels of investment in the rail network.
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NewsNIR staves off closure
UK: Rail services in Northern Ireland look more secure after a ruling by the Northern Ireland Assembly to consolidate rather than shut down the 357 km network. Following a report commissioned by Translink from A D Little, a task force convened by the Assembly carried out public consultation. Four ...
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HSL-Zuid concessions
NETHERLANDS: This month is due to see the signing of a formal contract for operation of services on the HSL-Zuid high speed line between Amsterdam, Rotterdam and the Belgian border. The Dutch Ministry of Transport & Water Management announced on October 17 that it had reached agreement with the ...
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China speeds up again
CHINA: October 21 saw the introduction of Chinese Railways’ 2001-02 national timetable, implementing a further network- wide increase in train speeds. Vice- Minister of Railways Liu Zhijun announced that passenger train speeds would be raised from 120 to 140 and 140 to 160 km/h, following the completion of upgrading ...
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NewsEcotram research aims to cut tram energy consumption
AUSTRIA: Technische Universität Wien is heading a consortium of Wien transport operator Wiener Linien, Siemens, Vossloh Kiepe, Rail Tec Arsenal and SCHIG, which is undertaking research into operating strategies and design alterations which could lower the energy consumption of trams. Launched in March 2010 and backed by Austrian research agency ...
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Cross-border progress
PLANNING for construction of a standard-gauge rail link across the Pyrenees between Perpignan and Figueres moved forward on October 9, when the French government issued a Declaration of Public Utility for the line as far as the border at Le Perthus. Intended to carry both freight and passenger services, the ...
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Bureaucratic overkill
Sir - The Institute of Logistics & Transport’s report Railway Health & Safety Regulatory Strategy (RG 10.01 p664) appears to be a most apt and timely warning against the bureaucratic safety overkill that has been inflicted on Britain’s railways over the last decade or so. Indeed, Part 2 of Lord ...
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‘Shoddy and unacceptable’, says Marshall
Railtrack Chief Executive Steve Marshall tendered his resignation on October 8, describing the government’s treatment of his company and its shareholders as ’shoddy and unacceptable’. Intending to work out his six-month period of notice, Marshall said that his priorities now were to ’support the company, its people and the administrator’s ...
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News
Dieter
CAPTION: Austrian Federal Railways has brought a new twist to the tradition of school trains, bringing the school to the passengers instead of the passengers to the school. In conjunction with Innsbruck University, ÖBB is offering daily language classes in ex-dining cars on regional services. Dieter suggests this may be ...
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African wagon
KWIK Fab Projects has developed a low-cost, low-maintenance wagon for 40ft or smaller containers, aimed at metre and Cape gauge railways with limited resources. Designed to cost the same as a similar second-hand refurbished vehicle, drop side, stanchion and hopper models of the EA01 are available.Steel parts are protected from ...
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Industry News in Brief
Siemens Duewag Schienenfahrzeuge GmbH and Siemens Krauss Maffei Lokomotiven GmbH were formally merged into Siemens AG with effect from October 1.International Engineering plc and Queensland Rail are planning to bid jointly for expansion and rebuilding projects on the State Railway of Thailand network. International Engineering is also planning to invest ...
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Sidetrack
No go at Lo WuMORE than 200 passengers were stranded at Hong Kong’s Lo Wu border crossing on September 29, after refusing to leave a KCR East Rail train. Newspapers had incorrectly reported that opening hours at the checkpoint had been extended by 30 min to handle extra passengers on ...
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Metros
Bosnia-Herzegovina: Kosice Transport of Slovakia has delivered two 1989-built Tatra KT8D5 trams to Sarajevo. Pars Sumperk and Siemens are to refurbish 37 Tatra K2 trams for Sarajevo Tramway over five years.Canada: Services began on Ottawa’s O-Train diesel light rail line on October 15, using three Class 643 Talent DMUs. Mayor ...
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Subways recover swiftly
NEW YORK City Transit officials were amazed how well subway lines near the World Trade Center withstood the collapse of the two towers on September 11, especially as the top of some 85 year-old tunnels ran just 1·5m below street level. Credit was given to the subway’s designers, who supported ...
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A recipe for paralysis
IFTRANSPORT Secretary Stephen Byers had intended to bury the bad news about Railtrack by announcing it just before the bombing of Afghanistan commenced, he did not succeed.The immediate result of his action, which could at worst see shareholders left with nothing, was to enrage the financial institutions. Anthony Bolton at ...
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Market
Australia: New South Wales SRA is calling tenders for 14 diesel railcars for use in the Hunter Valley, and for 40 double-deck outer suburban EMU cars.Austria: Elin EBG has won a contract to fit radio remote control to 10 of ÖBB’s Class 1044 electric locomotives for mid-train working, with an ...
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INTELLIGENCE
Canada: On September 26 Canadian Pacific shareholders voted 98% in favour of the division of the company into five independent entities from October 1. The companies are CP Rail, Pan-Canadian Energy, CP Ships, Fording Coal and Fairmont Hotels & Resorts.China: The Ministry of Railways has announced plans for two further ...
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Wagon checking
LYNXRAIL has commissioned an Automated Train Examiner for BHP Iron Ore Railways. It uses machine vision technology and expert system software to measure component wear, detecting and reporting critical faults.Installed at the lineside, ATEx works at speeds up to 140 km/h. As a train passes, cameras and microphones take 135 ...