All Railway Gazette International articles in May 2012
All articles published this month.
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NewsEuroAirport station proposed in cross-border passenger plan
EUROPE: Plans for a direct rail connection to EuroAirport Basel Mulhouse Freiburg and the extension of Swiss regional services across the border to Mulhouse in France are included a memorandum of understanding which was signed by SBB, SNCF, the region of Alsace and the cantons of Aargau, Basel-Landschaft and Basel-Stadt ...
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NewsChiltern Railways puts refurbished Mk III coaches into service
UK: On May 28 Chiltern Railways put into service the first of four rakes of Mk III coaches that are being heavily refurbished and equipped with sliding plug doors. Deployed on London Marylebone - Birmingham Moor Street services, the Mk IIIs are marshalled between a Class 67 locomotive and a ...
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NewsGE Transportation to move headquarters to Chicago
USA: GE Transportation announced on May 30 that it had selected Chicago as the location for its global headquarters. The company's plant in Erie, Pennsylvania, will remain the headquarters of its locomotive business, and it will still be the 'key manufacturing and engineering site'. 'We have transformed GE Transportation from ...
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NewsTatravagónka acquires bogie manufacturer
GERMANY: Slovak wagon builder Tatravagónka has completed the acquisition of bogie manufacturer ELH Eisenbahnlaufwerke Halle. Tatravagónka has bought the 70% stake in ELH which was held by Andreas Goer, the majority shareholder in wagon leasing firm AAE Holding, and the 30% which was held by another business partner. The participants ...
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NewsColas buys Pullman Rail
UK: Colas Rail Ltd announced on May 21 that it had acquired Pullman Rail Ltd, the rolling stock maintenance and refurbishment contractor based at Canton depot in Cardiff. As well as significantly increasing its own fleet maintenance capability, Colas says that the acquistion will enable it to ‘further expand’ into ...
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NewsSochi’s swallow starts to fly
RUSSIA: Trial running has started in Sochi with the first of 38 Lastochka EMUs being supplied by Siemens in time for the 2014 Winter Olympic & Paralympic Games. The multiple-unit was due to be presented to RZD Vice-President Valentin Gapanovich and Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov by the ...
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NewsIndian wagon component joint venture agreed
INDIA: Steel Authority of India Ltd and wagon manufacturer Burn Standard Co Ltd have agreed to form a Rs2bn joint venture to produce wagon components at BSCL's Jellingham plant in West Bengal. The venture will have the capacity to produce 10 000 bogies and 10 000 couplers a year ...
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NewsThales awarded ETCS contract in Hungary
HUNGARY: Infrastructure development agency NIF has awarded Thales Austria a contract to design and supply ETCS Level 2 for the 101 km Boba - Bajánsenye section of Pan-European Corridor V, and adapt existing Level 1 equipment. The EU is meeting 85% of the €18m cost of the project, which will ...
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NewsHo Chi Minh City metro line 1 construction contract signed
VIETNAM: A contract for the construction of the first stage of Ho Chi Minh City metro line 1 was signed on May 16, paving the way for main works to begin in September. The 17·1 km elevated section between Ben Thanh Market and Suoi Tien Park with 11 stations is ...
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NewsAlstom begins work on bogie plant
CANADA: A ceremony on May 18 launched construction of a new Alstom plant at the Ludger-Simard industrial estate in Sorel-Tracy, Québec. Alstom will use the site to assemble bogies for 468 rubber-tyred metro cars which Société de Transport de Montréal ordered from a Bombardier/Alstom consortium in October 2010. The C$1·2bn ...
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NewsTaiwan High Speed Rail Corp orders more trains
TAIWAN: Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp has ordered a further four Series 700T trainsets from a consortium of Japanese firms Kawasaki Heavy Industries and Toshiba Corp. The 12-car trains designed for 300 km/h operation are scheduled to be delivered between December 2012 and November 2015. They will enable THSRC to ...
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NewsJoint venture formed to run Algerian tramways
ALGERIA: A joint venture company to operate and maintain tram lines in Algeria has been formed by the RATP Dev subsidiary of Paris transport operator RATP (49%) and local organisations Entreprise du Métro d'Alger (30%) and Etablissement Public de Transport Urbain et Suburbain d'Alger (21%). The joint venture will operate ...
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NewsMasabi to launch smartphone ticketing in Boston
USA: Mobile ticketing technology company Masabi is supplying Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority with what it says will be the USA’s first smartphone rail ticketing system. Masabi is to provide iPhone, Android and BlackBerry apps, back-end servers, payment integration and barcode validation software for onboard staff. A pilot will begin shortly, ...
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News'Solid commercial performance' at Alstom
ALSTOM: Presenting the company's results for 2011-12 on May 4, Chairman & CEO Patrick Kron announced a 'solid commercial performance' for the last financial year, with sales gradually recovering. In the year to March 31 2012 Alstom booked €21·7bn of orders, up 14% on the previous year. Emerging countries accounted ...
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NewsPortland light rail expansion funding signed
USA: The Federal Transit Administration has signed the full-funding grant agreement allowing TriMet to proceed with construction of the Portland-Milwaukie light rail project and order a further 18 Siemens light rail vehicles. The $745·2m grant signed on May 22 will cover half of the $1·49bn cost of the 11·3 km ...
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NewsBuenos Aires commuter railway concession revoked
ARGENTINA: Federal Planning Minister Julio De Vido announced on May 24 that Trenes de Buenos Aires would be stripped of its concession to operate the Sarmiento and Mitre commuter networks. The decision to revoke the concession by means of a presidential decree had been taken because of inadequate rolling ...
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News
Carsten Gerner
Carsten Gerner and Helge Israelsen have been nominated for election to the DSB Board of Directors by Danish Transport Minister Henrik Dam Kristensen.
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NewsFinal phase of KiwiRail turnaround funded
NEW ZEALAND: The government's 2012-13 budget unveiled on May 24 has allocated NZ$250m of capital funding to KiwiRail, the final instalment in a three-year NZ$750m package to support the national railway's Turnaround Plan announced in 2010. The funding will be used to remove capacity constraints and improve the reliability of ...
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NewsAlstom buys DB stake in locomotive joint venture
GERMANY: On May 22 Alstom announced it had signed a contract to take over the 49% stake in the Alstom Lokomotiven Service joint venture which is held by DB Mobility Logistics, giving it full control. The joint venture was formed in 2002 and is based at Stendal. It now has ...
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NewsBearing test facility opened
RUSSIA: SKF has opened a railway axlebox bearing test facility at its Tver factory which it says is the first to be certified under new Russian safety norms. The Tver factory was opened in 2010 to produce sealed and pre-lubricated compact tapered bearing units for Russian and international customers. ...