Main line rail industry news – Page 1412
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News
Praha’s first M1 trainset handed over
ON JULY 8 the first of 22 five-car metro trainsets for the Praha metro was handed over to DPHMP at the Kacerov depot in the Czech capital. Following acceptance trials it will be unveiled to the public later this month at the Brno International Engineering Fair.DPHMP expects to have 15 ...
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EC directives seek genuine open access
PROPOSALS for three directives intended to prevent the national railways from blocking access to their tracks by competitors were launched by European Transport Commissioner Neil Kinnock on July 22. He said they would ’make a major contribution to ensuring that rail can compete effectively with other forms of transport’.The first ...
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Governments clash on interstate plans
Western Australia’s Transport Minister Murray Criddle announced on July 30 that Westrail is to be sold as a vertically integrated freight operation in the second quarter of 1999. The state will retain ownership of the land, and of suburban and country passenger services. Federal Transport Minister Mark Vaile responded by ...
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Higher wagons optimise axleloads
A study conducted by Massachusetts Institute of Technology for the Association of American Railroads has proposed the use of higher, shorter wagons to optimise application of heavier axleloads.Drawing data from 22 sample coal train flows from across North America, researchers compared a standard 16m four-axle wagon with 30 tonne axleloads ...
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Alice in Texas
ON JULY 31 the Surface Transportation Board released Union Pacific from the emergency order it had imposed on October 31. Admitting that UP has still not restored normal service on all routes, the STB said that it could not force the railway to continue assigning business to other carriers who ...
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Innovative hiccup
THIRTEEN consortia which submitted bids for the Briztram light rail line in Brisbane (RG 6.98 p371) had their applications returned unopened at the end of July. Incoming Queensland Premier Peter Beattie feels that light rail is ’19th century technology’ and he wants something ’futuristic’ to celebrate the next millenium.What he ...
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Time to face the real issues
UPHEAVAL at Polish State Railways looks inevitable as management and government struggle with the complexities of restructuring and possible privatisation. While the imminent order for high speed tilting trains (p563) suggests that PKP is up with Europe’s leaders in technology and expertise, much ground has to be made up in ...
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TBTC benefits prove elusive
TEN years ago British Rail conceived the idea of a massive upgrade to its West Coast main line linking London with Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and Glasgow, which was in need of overhaul after electrification in the 1960s and 1970s. Some slight delay was necessary while the previous government sold off ...
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Jinghu spearheads high-speed ambitions
CONSTRUCTION of the 1307 km Jinghu high-speed line from Beijing to Shanghai is now expected to get under way in 2000. Shen Zhijie, Director General of the High-Speed Railway Pre-Feasibility Study Office at the Ministry of Railways, announced in June that initial design work had been completed, and that the ...
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Bordeaux rouge turns yellow
VINTAGE debates have a habit of outlasting the politicians in the French wine capital Bordeaux. The one about a tram network has been going on since 1981, and it could run for a while yet. Earlier battles were about the choice between a steel-wheeled tramway and a rubber-tyred VAL mini-metro, ...
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London smartcard concession signed
LONDON Transport signed the long-awaited Prestige smartcard fare collection contract with the TranSys consortium on August 13 after what LT's Commercial Director David Bailey described as 'tough and protracted' negotiations. Worth £1bn over 17 years, the deal has been agreed under the terms of Britain's Private Finance Initiative. TranSys ...
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Øresund sets July 1 2000 target date
INTRO: As construction work passed the half-way stage, Andrew Hellawell viewed construction sites around Kastrup, and took a stroll in the immersed tube tunnelØRESUNDSKONSORTIET has set the provisional date for opening the fixed link between Denmark and Sweden. Of course, this is dependent on keeping to time through the rest ...
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Regifercam concession
THE CAMEROON government has selected two rival groups to operate its national railways over the next 20 years. Under a tendering process started in 1996, it had been seeking established railway operating concessionaires with local backing to take a majority stake in national railway authority Regifercam. Two main bidders were ...
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Orders galore
WITH German Railway exercising an option for 400 freight locos on July 10 (p499), French National Railways clearly did not wish to be left behind. On July 21 it announced an Ecu272m order for 120 units to be built by Alstom for delivery from 2001; 90 will be dual-voltage (25 ...
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Coal drives Central Asian links
CONSTRUCTION work has started on a north-south rail link in the Central Asian state of Kyrgyzstan, opening up mineral reserves in the centre of the republic. Starting from the terminus of the existing line through the capital Bishkek at Balykchy (formerly Issyk-Kul), the route runs southwest to Kochgorka, where the ...
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Pakistan split delayed
INCORPORATION of Pakistan Railways’ three operating business units, scheduled for July 1, was delayed for at least two weeks at the last minute. Managing Directors had been designated for the passenger, freight and infrastructure units (p508), and were due to be formally appointed by the Prime Minister at the end ...
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DB and NS merge freight businesses
ON JUNE 23 German Railway and Netherlands Railways announced the merger of their freight businesses to form Rail Cargo Europe (RG 4.98 p207). A Memorandum of Understanding was signed by DB Cargo General Manager Eberhard Sinnecker and Director of NS Cargo Ed Smulders pending approval of the merger by competition ...
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Cheaper option
RUSSIA’S HOPES of building the Moscow - St Petersburg high speed line suffered a heavy blow last month when some provisions of the decree signed by President Yeltsin on September 13 1991 establishing the Russian High Speed Shareholding Co RAO VSM were wiped off the statute book. All that has ...
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Product News
OLE inspection equipment India's Research Designs & Standards Organisation has awarded two contracts totalling £1·6m to SMIS of Guildford, Britain, for overhead line inspection equipment using instrumented pantographs. 16 units will be installed in new vehicles built by the Integral Coach Factory and another ...
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Heathrow Express off to flying start
INTRO: Murray Hughes reports from the 160 km/h rail link serving Europe’s busiest airportBRITAIN’S Prime Minister Tony Blair inaugurated the Heathrow Express service between London Paddington and Heathrow airport on June 23. Riding the 10.10 from Paddington, he was accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Environment, ...