Main line rail industry news – Page 1435
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News
Old Colony plugs Boston’s commuting gap
INTRO: Richard Hope reports on the reopening of a three-line network partially abandoned since 1959 which forms one of the biggest current commuter rail projects around US cities NOVEMBER 30 saw all day service introduced on 106route-km of the former Old Colony Railroad to the southeast of Boston after a ...
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Business plan to be backed by investment
INTRO: Italian State Railways is implementing a four-year business plan aimed at driving the business into the black. With many projects already under way, the 70000bn lire plan means that 150000bn lire will have been invested in 1994-2006THIS MONTH sees Italian State Railways take one more step towards a commercial ...
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Passante aims for completion in 2003
INTRO: Following the official opening of the first section between Bovisa and Porta Venezia, completion of Milano’s cross-city route is now expected to take a further five years. Robert Preston reportsOFFICIAL OPENING of the first section of Milano’s Passante cross-city suburban railway was scheduled to take place on December 21. ...
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Puget Sound picks integrated rail option
INTRO: A 55 km commuter rail line is due to start running between Seattle and Tacoma next year. This is the first stage in an ambitious 10-year programme to develop commuter and light rail routes throughout the Puget Sound regionBYLINE: William D Middleton’AMONG THE major US urban areas without a ...
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Saarbahn cars in the city streets
EUROPE’S second light rail operation sharing tracks with a main line railway was formally opened on October 24, in the German city of Saarbrücken. Following the lead set in nearby Karlsruhe, which launched dual-mode through working in 1992, Saarbrücken has plans for an extensive network of routes that will allow ...
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Seventh heaven as the Trolley keeps growing
Shopping centres and a sports stadium offer major traffic potential along the latest extension of San Diego’s light rail network, which continues the city’s successful 16-year policy of incremental expansion. Julian Wolinsky joined the opening celebrations
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Tendered operation cuts costs
ON JANUARY 1 Stockholm’s narrow-gauge commuter services transfer to private-sector management. Bus operator Linjebuss and Adtranz will run the three 891mm gauge routes for five years under contract to AB Storstockholms Lokaltrafik. Over the past five years, SL has contracted out operation of tram, bus and metro routes in a ...
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Vaglia tunnel advances at 10m a day
CONSTRUCTION of Italy’s third high speed railway is forging ahead. Following completion of the Roma - Firenze direttissima in 1992, preliminary work began two years later on the 220 km Roma - Napoli leg of the Alta Velocità network, and the main civil engineering work got under way in 1995 ...
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Light rail to augment expanding network
INTRO: Preliminary engineering has started for two light rail lines in Vancouver, British Columbia, to augment existing mini-metro and commuter rail routes. Construction is due to get under way in 1999, with the first low-floor cars running by 2005. William D Middleton reportsA 33 km light rail network will be ...
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Operators line up
DUTCH Minister of Transport & Waterways Annemarie Lebink has approved 19 organisations to run on the Railned network in addition to Netherlands Railways. This is part of the programme to open up the national network to competing operators, all of whom must first gain a Railned safety certificate and then ...
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Why not sell off the infrastructure as well?
SINCE 1992, there has been an explosion in rolling stock leasing outside the US, where it has been commonplace for years (RG 1.97 p5). The new deals are primarily in Europe, but east Asia including Japan was starting to open up before financial crises hit the region last autumn.Now an ...
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Bids recalled
LAST MONTH a fresh municipal administration was due to take office in Mexico City under the reformist mayor Cuauhtemoc Cardenas. One of the first tasks facing Cardenas was to take a decision on the stalled contract for 252 new cars for Line B of the metro.Trouble erupted last July, when ...
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Emergency extended
DESPITE strong arguments by Union Pacific Chairman Dick Davidson, the Surface Transportation Board on December 4 issued an instruction for a 100-day extension of its emergency order requiring UP to co-operate with competing railways to clear the backlog of shipments that has choked much of its western network. UP and ...
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Clinton signs, Downs resigns
PRESIDENT Bill Clinton signed the Amtrak Reform & Accountability Act on December 2, giving America’s inter-city passenger railway a long-sought degree of financial stability. Amtrak President, Chairman & Chief Executive Thomas Downs said it would ’give Amtrak the ability to plan for the future. With these funds and adequate annual ...
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Time to challenge rules and standards
’THE DANGER of standards for absolutely every eventuality is fatigue, and complacency that we have safety through the most complete set of procedures imaginable. Paper safety is dangerous and no substitute for effective leadership.’ This is heresy in an industry which has traditionally relied on rules rather than personal judgement ...
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Ambitious plans
IN A NOTABLE shift in policy, the Turkish Transport & Communications Ministry announced in December that investment in railway upgrading and new construction is to be stepped up. Speaking two weeks ahead of a National Railway Congress held in Istanbul on December 15-17, Transport Minister Necdet Menzir indicated that railways ...
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Baltimore opens LRT extensions
DECEMBER 5 saw the dedication of two long-awaited light rail branches in Baltimore, which opened to revenue services the next day. The short city-centre spur to Penn Station and the line to Baltimore-Washington International Airport coincided with the completion of a major expansion at BWI.Baltimore is now the only US ...
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Car revamp as CTA goes DOO
CHICAGO Transit Authority announced on December 10 that it had awarded a $169m contract to GEC Alsthom Transportation Inc of New York for mid-life refurbishment of 284 metro cars, with options covering a further 314 vehicles. The 2600 series cars were supplied by Budd between 1981 and 1987, and are ...
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Pontinha opened
METROPOLITANO de Lisboa has completed a 1.5 km extension of its northwestern route from Colégio Militar to Pontinha, with an intermediate station at Carnide. Started four years ago, the work has been delayed by bad weather and geological problems. Construction was contracted to the Metrogal consortium incuding Construçoes Técnicas and ...
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Line 2 gets under way
GROUNDBREAKING ceremonies for Manila light metro Line 2 were held on November 15, with President Fidel Ramos inaugurating the project at a site in Aurora Boulevard in Quezon City. To be financed by Japan’s Overseas Economic Co-operation Fund, the 14 km elevated line is to be completed by 2001.Costed at ...