Australia: NSW Rail Services Authority has won a contract to fit out the tunnels on the New Southern Railway Sydney Airport Link, including track, signalling, electrification and communications.
Belgium: De Lijn has exercised part of its option to order six more single-direction LRVs for Antwerpen and three bi-directional LRVs for Gent from Siemens Verkehrstechnik for BFr620m. Adtranz will supply IGBT inverters and four 95 kW AC traction motors, DWA the bodies, and SGP Graz the bogies.
Denmark: Ansaldo Trasporti has awarded a DKr30m turnkey contract to C J Jensen A/S to build a control and maintenance centre for the København Bybanen mini-metro.
France: SNCF has ordered 32 integrated electronic interlocking systems and TVM430 automatic train control for the TGV Mediterranée high-speed line from CSEE Transport for Fr87m.
Germany: DB’s Long-Distance Passenger business plans to call tenders this year for 20, 30 or 40 locos for European-wide use on night trains, and is currently discussing the possibility of sharing the order with DB Cargo to bring the unit cost down.
FVAG of Freiburg im Breisgau has ordered nine bi-directional Combino LRVs from Siemens for DM4m each, with an option for eight more. The 41m metre-gauge vehicles will be 2·3m wide with six of their eight axles powered.
India: GEC Alsthom, Hitachi, Siemens and a consortium of BHEL and Holec have bid to supply EMU drives to Indian Railways, worth some Rs2bn. Bids for supplying diesel loco drives have come from BHEL, GEC Alsthom, GE Transportation Systems and General Motors.
Indian Railways expects by March 1998 to begin production of its first two electric locos with three-phase drives under a 1993 technology transfer agreement with ABB Transportation; 80 locos are to be built between 1998 and 2000.
Ireland: Iarnród éireann has awarded an Ecu9m contract to Adtranz Fixed Installations Group for 1·5 kV DC electrification on Dublin’s DART extensions from Howth Junction to Malahide and Bray to Greystones, totalling 15·2route-km.
Italy: Under its CTC Grande Rete programme, FS has awarded four contracts totalling 250bn lire to Ansaldo Segnalmento Ferroviario for six operations control centres at Genova, Venezia and Napoli, and covering the Genova - Roma, Bologna - Bari and Bologna - Brennero routes.
Poland: Adtranz Pafawag has won a contract to supply 501 sets of Y25 bogies to MSV of the Czech Republic.
Spain: The Ministry of Development has called bids for consultants to examine options for a new alignment to replace the Pajares pass route through the Cantabrian Mountains between León and Oviedo.
USA: Conrail has selected the Railroad Electronics Division of Rockwell Transportation Electronics to develop an on-board electronic interface platform for its Positive Train Control project (RG 7.97p431).
NJ Transit has awarded a US$16·6m contract to Union Switch & Signal to install a cab signalling-based Advanced Speed Enforcement System on commuter routes.
Virginia Railway Express has ordered an OrbTrac 100 global positioning system from Orbital Sciences Corp for US$1m. From mid-1998, VRE’s 14 locos will be able to report their location to the operations centre every 1 to 5min.
Triple Crown Services has ordered 730 more RoadRailer bimodal vehicles and bogies from Wabash National Corp for US$33m, following expansion of the network to Dallas, Fort Worth and other Texas centres via BNSF from Kansas City.
Vietnam: DSVN has ordered 10 Class D12E 883 kW Bo-Bo diesel locos from CKD Dopravni Systemy of the Czech Republic. The order includes an option for 30 locos to a more powerful design.
