Main line rail industry news – Page 1393
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News
INTELLIGENCE
CAPTION: Luxembourg Railways has started putting into service its Class 3000 dual-system electric locos being supplied by Alstom Transport. CFL is buying 20 of the 3 kV DC / 25 kV 50Hz units as a joint order with SNCB’s 60 Class 13 Tractis fleet (RG 5.98 p325), and examples were ...
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News
INTELLIGENCE
CAPTION: Swedish iron ore mining group LKAB has taken delivery of five prototype Uanoo wagons from Transwerk of South Africa for MTAB to test on the Luleå - Kiruna - Narvik Malmbanan. LKAB must decide by September 1 whether to order a 68 vehicle trainset of the 120 tonne GLW ...
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NEWS
CAPTION: A ceremony at Tokyo Central on March 13 marked the start of revenue services with the first production Series 700 shinkansen trains developed by JR Central and JR West (RG 10.98 p697). Four trains will work three Nozomi expresses each way between Tokyo and Hakata, cutting 7min off ...
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MTR sale
Presenting the region's budget to the Legislative Council on March 3, Hong Kong's Financial Secretary Donald Tsang Yam-kuen announced that metro operator MTR Corp will be partially privatised in the next two years. The administration plans 'to privatise a substantial minority share of MTRC through a public offering', ...
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Dutch bloomers
NS Groep NV has raised its net operating profit by just over 20% to 197m guilders, largely by improved performance from the passenger business NS Reizigers. Revenue grew by 9%, but operating costs fell, despite a 5% increase in the number of trains running from May 1998, and a fares ...
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News
INTELLIGENCE
CAPTION: This month is due to see the completion of the 70 km cut-off between Beitbridge and West Nicholson in southern Zimbabwe, by contractor Murray & Roberts. Operation of the line, which will provide a direct route from the South African border to Bulawayo, has been contracted to a joint ...
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Metros
Argentina: Metrovías has received 12 of 30 cars for Buenos Aires Line D from Nagoya Metro, costing 25m pesos. They have been refurbished for 1·5 kV DC overhead by Osaka Sharyo Kogyo Co Ltd with electronic traction equipment.China: On March 5 Hong Kong MTR Corp awarded an HK$1·1bn contract to ...
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Letters
New York, New YorkSir - I refer to Alan Levitt’s letter about Grand Central Terminal (RG 2.99 p78). Unfortunately, there are several factual errors which need to be corrected.The terminal was opened for service in November 1913 as the third station in that location. The first two stations were replaced ...
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News
Haenel worked, so what now?
REVIEWING progress with the programme to transfer responsibility for regional rail services to local government at a special seminar in the French Senate on March 4, Transport Minister Jean-Claude Gayssot announced that he would ’make efforts to extend regionalisation’. Judging by the performance of the six regions where the experiment ...
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Market
Argentina: Under its 1999-2000 investment programme, Ferrosur has signed an agreement to purchase four locomotives from General Electric. Wagon rebuilding is providing 120 additional container flats and 200 cement hoppers. Australia: National Rail Corp has ordered 10 side-tipping wagons from Evans Deakin Industries subsidiary Clyde Engineering at a cost of ...
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News
INTELLIGENCE
Argentina: Subject to government approval, Industrias Metalúrgicas Pescarmona SA expected to complete in March the sale of its majority holdings in the Buenos Aires al Pacífico and Mesopot
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News
Modern steam serves niche markets
A Swiss company has rebuilt a main line steam locomotive in an experiment to assess the viability of a marriage between the earliest and the latest traction technology
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News
Frantour sold
FRENCH National Railways’ holding arm SNCF Participations (formerly Sceta) has sold its interest in travel agency Frantour to the Accor group, which also owns Wagons Lits. On-train services accounted for 26·7% of Accor’s turnover during 1998, the company announced on February 11.SNCF Participations’ President Jean-Pierre Leclerc is also looking at ...
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Night train revamp
German Railway is spending over DM120m in a programme to refurbish its couchette and sleeping car fleet. From the start of the summer timetable at the end of May, overnight trains will be marketed as ’DB Nachtzug’. Marketing and management will be in the hands of DB AutoZug, a DB ...
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NEWS
March 10 saw the restoration of rail freight services between Yugoslavia and Bosnia-Herzegovina with the reopening of the line between Brasina in Serbia and Zvornik Novia in Bosnia. Common regulations for train operations were agreed by JZ and BHZJK on March 5 under the terms of a co-operation accord signed ...
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News
Juniper links
Silvertown UK Ltd’s Silentbloc Division is supplying torque reaction links to Alstom Gears Ltd for Juniper EMUs being built by Alstom Transport for Gatwick Express, South West Trains and ScotRail.One link is fitted between each gearbox and the bogie frame, with the heavy-duty rubber/metal construction serving to absorb shock forces ...
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News
Quiet slab track
Hsc Deutschland has developed the Promak¨ PU range of embedding compounds specifically for use with slab track on light rail, metro and suburban systems. Suitable for injection by machine or pouring by hand, the elastic polyurethane compounds can help to reduce airborne and structure-borne noise as well as vibration.The thickness ...
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DB prepares to launch Metropolitan
GERMAN RAILWAY will cautiously test the waters of privatisation next month. They will probably not be too cold, for the experiment falls well short of a true handover to the private sector, but it is a venture in that direction. DB has set up Metropolitan Express Train GmbH as a ...
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SRT investment hits all time high
BYLINE: Saravudh DhamasiriGeneral ManagerState Railway of ThailandDOUBLE TRACKING, electrification, new rolling stock and resignalling are spearheading investment plans in Thailand. More than 180bn baht (US$4·5bn) will be spent by SRT over the next 10 years.The package of modernisation measures includes construction of several new lines (Table I), which will in ...
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Design improvements help to keep diesel locos on the road
INTRO: Many developing railways face problems of locomotive availability; simple design changes to overcome common faults may have significant returns in reduced failures and quicker maintenanceBYLINE: S Gopalan*Advisor, MechanicalIrcon InternationalBYLINE: * Mr S Gopalan was previously Chief Motive Power Engineer for India’s Southern Railway, and spent four years at ...