Main line rail industry news – Page 1396
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Market share increasing
AS EUROPE’s railways cast around for the best structures to manage and operate international freight trains, evidence suggests that rail is at long last starting to increase its share of the freight market in Western Europe, with cross-border tonnage showing significant growth. The European Council of Ministers of Transport reports ...
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Rivals back competing routes to viability
ANYONE seeking an insight into high level thinking on the strategic plans of European Railways would have been well rewarded by attending the EuroRail Congress ’99, staged in Paris on January 26-28 by AiC Worldwide. Delegates were treated to agenda-setting presentations and forthright views from senior figures on competition, open ...
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CN plans for the next millennium
BYLINE: Paul M TellierPresident & Chief Executive OfficerCanadian National RailwayCANADIAN NATIONAL has taken decisive steps to meet the challenges and opportunities of the next millennium. By the end of this year CN and its customers will be positioned to reap the benefits of the increasing integration of the North American ...
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AC diesels head CPR investment drive
BYLINE: Rob RitchiePresidentCanadian Pacific RailwayCanadian Pacific Railway begins the last year of the 20th century with a substantially improved cost structure and profitability, a rejuvenated infrastructure, and a service level that is turning heads in the industry and winning business from our competitors. Our key operating measures - on-time performance, ...
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UIC sets European emissions standards
INTRO: Diesel traction offers flexibility for international freight operation in a liberalised European market, but railways need to maintain their green credentials at a time of growing environmental awareness and ever-stricter emissions limits. Revised UIC emissions standards offer an alternative to individual tests by national approval authorities BYLINE: Hans PaukertProject ...
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Mixed fortunes in the railcar market
INTRO: The wide variety of lightweight diesel railcar designs ordered for regional services in Europe are proving popular with passengers, but most have failed to meet the operators’ ambitious delivery timescales. Harry Hondius MSc Eng reviews developmentsLOOKING AT THE lightweight diesel railcar industry at the end of 1998, it is ...
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Gauge-changing EMU on the road to success
Last November, Japan's Railway Technical Research Institute unveiled the world's first multi-voltage gauge-changing trainset. Following tests on JR West, the unit will be run at up to 250 km/h in Pueblo from April
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Sydneysiders await Millennium double-deckers
INTRO: From 2001 commuters in Australia’s largest city are set to benefit from a fleet of 20 double-deck trains to be built and maintained by Clyde Engineering. These fourth generation Millennium trains will continue the progress achieved by the Tangara fleet, with the latest traction equipmentBYLINE: Colin F G Butcher*Director,ACB ...
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Via reaches a critical watershed
BYLINE: Rod MorrisonPresident & Chief Executive OfficerVia Rail CanadaAT THE END of the 1990s, Via Rail Canada has a new spirit of vitality and a commitment to explore the fresh thinking needed to take Canada’s passenger rail services into the next century. Over the past two decades we have delivered ...
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Contracts cut commissioning
Substantial efficiency gains have been achieved by Denmark’s infrastructure manager, Banestyrelsen, thanks to a law introduced on January 1 1997 which requires materials and work to be procured by open tender - although it has not been fully applied yet.Director of Infrastructure Services Jesper Toft told AiC’s Infrastructure Maintenance & ...
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Scrap into gold
WHAT DO you do when you have converted over 5000 route-km of metre-gauge line to broad gauge, and have an fleet of relatively modern rolling stock surplus to requirements? That was the question Indian Railways posed to Rail India Technical & Economic Services.Rites was asked to find new uses for ...
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Expansion ends innovations
LAST MONTH Canadian Pacific’s eastern subsidiary St Lawrence & Hudson was to boost the capacity of its Montreal - Toronto roll-on, roll-off piggyback service by putting into revenue service the original experimental Iron Highway trainset. This is a holding move pending the arrival of another 240 platforms ordered from National ...
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Melbourne shortlist
NINE consortia lodged indicative bids in January for the five rail-based passenger operations being franchised by Victoria’s state government. British bus and rail operators such as Stagecoach, National Express and FirstGroup are well represented, and a shortlist of final bidders was due last month. Largest of the operators set up ...
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Subway expansion floated
A surge of Subway building reminiscent of the 1930s could engulf New York City under a grandiose scheme dubbed MetroLink by the Regional Plan Association. It would cost $13bn, add 20% to the network length, serve new areas of the city and add capacity for 250000 daily riders, says RPA.The ...
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DB back on the defensive
DESPITE the widely-trumpeted reform programme that puts German Railway on a fresh footing with a holding company and quasi-independent subsidiaries, the organisation’s trials and tribulations are far from over. Problems with the Class 611 tilting diesel sets continue, and the latest timetables show a 20min journey time increase on the ...
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Flangeways at risk
A RULING by the Supreme Court of Canada on January 28 could have a serious impact on the ability of rail to service industry over tracks laid in public highways, common in North America.Murray Ryan was badly injured in 1987, when the wheel of his motorcycle dropped into the flangeway ...
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More TENs in prospect
IN THE VIEW of Thomas Barrett, Adviser in the Directorate for Lending Operations at the European Investment Bank, Europe’s railways have done well in loans or grants from the EIB in the last 10 years. Speaking at AiC Worldwide’s EuroRail Congress in Paris on January 26 (p141), Barrett noted that ...
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Market orientation
ELECTED as Chairman of the Union of European Railway Industries in Brussels on February 16, Rolf Eckrodt confirmed that he planned to continue the strategy of his predecessor Kaare Vagner in making Unife more market oriented. In this he will be backed up by new General Manager Drewin Nieuwenhuis.Eckrodt identified ...
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TBM launched
CEREMONIES were held in Bangkok on February 5, when Thai Prime Minister Chuan commissioned the first tunnel boring machine for the northern section of the Blue line metro. According to the Mass Rapid Transit Authority, work on the 11 km northern section from Rama IX Road to Bang Sue is ...
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BART cars refurbished
ON JANUARY 14, San Francisco’s Bay Area Rapid Transit District unveiled the first three of 439 Rohr cars to be remanufactured by Adtranz in Pittsburg, under a $454m contract due to be completed in 2002. Built more than 25 years ago, the cars are being converted from DC to AC ...