Main line rail industry news – Page 778
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NewsMajor customer buys Seaboard Railcar Repair
USA: The Trinity Railcar Repair subsidiary of Trinity Industries announced its acquisition of Seaboard Railcar Repair on November 4. Seaboard provides maintenance, specialised cleaning, lining, painting, inspection and testing services for tank cars and other wagons. The acquisition includes two maintenance facilities in Oklahoma and North Carolina. Trinity's wagon leasing ...
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NewsMorson acquires Vital Services businesses
UK: The assets and business of seven companies from the Vital Services Group have been acquired from the joint administrators by recruitment and engineering services provider Morson Group. Manchester-based recruitment and training company Vital Services Group directly employs 208 staff and contracts a further 2 000 to companies including Network ...
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NewsShanghai tram proposal
CHINA: Shanghai Transport & Port Authority has proposed a 90 km, six-line tram network in the southwestern Songjiang district. This is the first stage of a plan for an 800 km network by 2020. The plan envisages that the 16 km route T1 from Xinsongjiang Road to Xinqiao would be ...
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NewsCityCube Berlin to be part of InnoTrans 2014
INNOTRANS: The CityCube Berlin multi-purpose trade fair, conference and event hall is to be used to provide two extra 6 000 m2 exhibition floors for InnoTrans 2014, which will be held at Messe Berlin's ExpoCenter City site on September 23-26 2014. CityCube Berlin is currently under construction on the site ...
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NewsSiemens unveils first Avenio tram in München
GERMANY: The first Siemens Avenio tram was publicly unveiled in München on November 4. In September 2012 München utility body SWM awarded Siemens a €29m contract for eight vehicles, designated Type T1 by city transport operator MVG. Following testing, the trams will enter passenger service alongside the Bombardier/Siemens Type ...
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NewsRail Freight Alliance formed
UK: Five leading rail freight operators announced on October 31 that they had formed a new alliance with infrastructure manager Network Rail, ‘with a view to delivering a sustainable and flourishing rail freight sector’. The five are DB Schenker Rail UK, Freightliner Group, GB Railfreight, Direct Rail Services and Colas ...
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NewsAdelaide tram expansion plan launched
AUSTRALIA: South Australia Premier Jay Weatherill has begun public consultation on an integrated transport & land use plan for the Adelaide region. It has been developed by the South Australia government together with industry groups and government agencies. Total cost of the 30-year package is put at A$36bn, with an ...
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NewsUrban rail news in brief - November 2013
Last month EIB signed a €50m loan agreement to fund road modernisation projects in Sofia including the upgrade of 7·6 km of tramway. Oklahoma City has approved funding for a US$130m tram line. Phase 1 would run for around 8 km and have six air-conditioned vehicles. The French ...
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NewsAlstom opens high speed train delivery centre
FRANCE: Alstom officially opened a 'delivery centre' for Euroduplex double-deck high speed trainsets at its Belfort factory on October 24. The delivery centre has been developed over four years as part of Alstom's strategy of exercising tighter control over its testing and commissioning cycles, and equipping itself to be able ...
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NewsFertiliser wagon deliveries underway
RUSSIA: Fertiliser and chemical transport company Acron-Trans is taking delivery of 400 mineral fertiliser hopper wagons ordered from United Wagon Co's leasing business Rail1520 under a three-year lease. The wagons are being built by United Wagon Co's Tikhvin Railway Car Building Plant for delivery by January 2014. They are fitted ...
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NewsCross-border RER Franco-Valdo-Genevois to serve Genève from 2017
EUROPE: SBB CEO Andreas Meyer and SNCF President Guillaume Pepy signed a letter of intent on October 30 setting out the next steps for the creation of a cross-border RER network centred on Genève. From December 2017 the 230 route-km RER Franco-Valdo-Genevois would serve a total of 45 stations, connecting ...
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NewsFeature articles in the November 2013 issue of Railway Gazette International
Comment Think international, think commercial News Main Line Urban Rail Market Industry Innovations Analysis Back under one roof in FranceEurostar wins from Fyra falloutUruguay’s open access vision Australasia Ensuring that rail delivers The AusRail Plus event in Sydney on November 26-28 will address the theme of ‘driving ...
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NewsDhaka metro construction officially launched
BANGLADESH: Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina laid the foundation stone for the Dhaka metro on October 31 at Bhawal Badre Alam University College Ground. The project is to be developed with Japanese assistance, following the signing of a 40-year soft loan agreement with JICA in February valued at ¥10·477bn. The ...
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NewsHitachi starts work on UK plant
UK: Secretary of State for Transport Patrick McLoughlin and Secretary of State for Business, Innovation & Skills Vince Cable visited Newton Aycliffe in County Durham on November 1 to mark the start of construction on the new rolling stock manufacturing plant being built for Hitachi Rail Europe. Lead contractor Shepherd ...
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NewsBase tunnel maintenance fleet ordered
SWITZERLAND: SBB has ordered a fleet of specialist track and infrastructure maintenance equipment from Harsco Rail for use in the Gotthard and Ceneri base tunnels from 2016. Valued at SFr93·7m, but with provision for further options, the contract announced on October 30 covers a fleet of 31 specialist machines including ...
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NewsInternational bodies sign pivotal railway law agreement
EUROPE: A renewable five-year co-ordination agreement which the Intergovernmental Organisation for International Carriage by Rail describes as 'pivotal for the development of international railway law' has been signed by OTIF, the European Railway Agency and DG Move, the European Commission's transport directorate. OTIF said the agreement signed in Brussels on ...
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NewsRail regulator sets out Network Rail funding and outputs for 2014-19
UK: On October 31 the Office of Rail Regulation published its final determination of infrastructure manager Network Rail's funding and what it must deliver in Control Period 5, which runs for five years from April 1 2014. ORR said the £38·293bn plan is designed to deliver 'better performance, more capacity, ...
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NewsHigh Speed Rail Corp of India launched
INDIA: Minister of Railways Mallikarjun Kharge officially launched High Speed Rail Corp of India on October 29. The subsidiary of state-owned railway project promoter Rail Vikas Nigam Ltd has been established to develop high speed corridors suitable for operation at speeds up to 350 km/h. HSRC will prepare studies and ...
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NewsConstruction of Sri Lanka's Southern Railway begins
SRI LANKA: A groundbreaking ceremony at Beliatta on October 28 launched construction of the 26·8 km first phase of the 115 km Southern Railway project. The extension of the line from Matara to serve Kekanadura, Babarenda, Wavurukannala and Beliatta is scheduled to open in 2016. The 1 676 mm gauge ...
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NewsHeavy-duty bogie rotators delivered down under
AUSTRALIA: Heavy lifting equipment manufacturer Mechan has completed its first delivery to Australia, supplying a pair of 10 tonne bogie rotators to Downer Rail's rolling stock maintenance depot at Newport in Victoria. The rotators comprise two independent structures which hold a bogie frame in place while it is rotated through ...