Passenger rail news – Page 211
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NewsHokkaido Shinkansen trainsets ordered
JAPAN: JR Hokkaido confirmed on April 16 that it had ordered four 320 km/h trainsets from Hitachi and Kawasaki Heavy Industries to operate its share of services on the Hokkaido Shinkansen. Designated Series H5, the trains are based on the Series E5 sets which JR East operates on the Tohoku ...
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NewsKŽC awarded Praha suburban contract
CZECH REPUBLIC: Praha urban transport authority Ropid has awarded private operator KŽC Doprava a 10-year contract to operate subsidised services on the 19 km suburban route S34 between Praha Masarykovo and Čakovice. Although Ropid had announced plans for an open competition in January, the contract was awarded without tendering following ...
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NewsMore capacity needed in Sweden
SWEDEN: In a report commissioned by the government, infrastructure manager Trafikverket has recommended that planning for a Y-shaped high speed network linking Stockholm, Göteborg and Malmö should continue because the extra capacity is needed. The study found that currently approved projects including the 150 km Ostlänken high speed line between ...
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NewsLEO Express plans Košice service
SLOVAKIA: Following the failure of its plans to enter the Polish market, Czech open access passenger operator LEO Express has announced its intention to extend its Praha - Ostrava - Bohumín - Karviná/Staré Město u Uherského Hradiště trains to Košice in eastern Slovakia from the 2014-15 timetable. LEO Express has ...
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NewsLoans to fund Croatian upgrading
CROATIA: Infrastructure manager Hrvatske Željeznice Infrastruktura has applied for a loan from the European Bank for Reconstruction & Development to help finance a €120m rehabilitation programme for the Savski Marof – Zagreb section of Trans-European Corridor X. The project covers 22 km of double-track on the western approach to the ...
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NewsS-Bahn Rhein-Main EMU deliveries begin
GERMANY: The first of 91 ET430 electric multiple-units ordered in November 2011 for use on S-Bahn Rhein-Main services was displayed to the public at Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof on April 11. DB Regio Hessen is initially putting the units into service on route S1 and airport services, before deployment across routes S1, ...
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NewsFinancial close on £2·7bn East Coast IEP contract
UK: Financial close on the £2·7bn contract for 65 Hitachi Super Express Trains to operate on the East Coast Main Line was announced on April 16. The trainsets are being procured from the Agility Trains consortium of Hitachi Rail Europe and John Laing under the Department for Transport’s Intercity Express ...
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NewsGreater Anglia direct award franchise agreed
UK: The Abellio Greater Anglia subsidiary of Dutch national operator NS is to continue operating passenger services between London Liverpool Street and eastern England under a new 27-month franchise agreement announced by the Department for Transport on April 16. The short-term direct award franchise runs from July 14 2014 to ...
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NewsMTR Express to launch in March 2015
SWEDEN: On April 15 MTR Nordic announced that its MTR Express service between Stockholm and Göteborg is expected to launch in March 2015. MTR has applied to infrastructure manager Trafikverket for 10 daily train paths in each direction from the start of the 2015 timetable in December; this is one ...
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NewsMelbourne Airport link endorsed
AUSTRALIA: A programme for construction of the long-planned rail link to Melbourne Airport will be included in Victoria’s state budget to be published on May 6, the state Premier Denis Napthine announced on April 13. Identified as one of several major expansion projects in Public Transport Victoria’s Metropolitan Rail Network ...
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NewsMore EMUs for London Overground
UK: Transport for London announced on April 9 that it would be inviting expressions of interest in a contract to supply electric multiple-units to operate routes that are to be transferred to its London Overground network in 2015. New rolling stock will also be required following electrification of London Overground’s ...
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NewsCSR locos arrive in Pakistan
PAKISTAN: CSR Ziyang has delivered an initial batch of five 2 000 hp diesel locomotives to Pakistan Railways. Unloading at the port of Karachi began on April 7, with the new locos due to undergo two weeks of testing before being accepted by PR. CSR is supplying a total of ...
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NewsHigh speed station planning progresses
ASIA: A high speed station is planned for the Sungai Besi regeneration zone south of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak announced on April 7 at the end of the fifth ‘leaders’ retreat’ with his Singaporean counterpart, Lee Hsien Loong. The two leaders reported that ‘good progress’ was being ...
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NewsGouda – Alphen concession awarded
NETHERLANDS: The province of Zuid-Holland has awarded NS Reizigers and Abellio Rail NRW GmbH a contract to operate passenger services on the 18 km Gouda – Alphen aan den Rijn route. Worth €3m a year, the contract is due to commence on December 11 2016 and will run for a ...
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NewsTCDD to order more high speed trains
TURKEY: National railway TCDD has issued a tender notice requesting offers by May 9 for the supply of a further 10 high speed trainsets. Respondents are requested to include in their bids three years of maintenance and the supply of 47 kits of spare parts. Last July TCDD placed an ...
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NewsDutch cabinet approves 15-year rail vision
NETHERLANDS: The cabinet has approved a report commissioned by the Ministry of Infrastructure & Environment which sets out a 15-year vision for the rail network. Known as LTSA II, the strategy envisages spending €18bn on maintaining and managing the existing network, and €10bn on new infrastructure. The main ambition is ...
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NewsSocial media could supplement passenger satisfaction surveys
UK: A research programme by DeltaRail is seeking to analyse train operators’ Twitter traffic to assess passenger satisfaction. It has been running for four months, and has already produced results which correlate with other satisfaction surveys DeltaRail analyses the content of tweets in the form of a ‘word cloud’. Generally, ...
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NewsMittelsachsen transport authority orders own EMUs
GERMANY: Transport authority Verkehrsverbund Mittelsachsen has awarded Alstom a €150m contract to supply 29 Coradia Continental 160 km/h electric multiple-units and maintain them for 16 years. The EMUs are to be built at Alstom's Salzgitter plant and are due to enter service in June 2016 on Elektronetz Mittelsachsen II services ...
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NewsFirst electrification-ready stock delivered to Israel Railways
ISRAEL: National railway ISR has taken delivery of the first six of 72 double-deck coaches which Bombardier Transportation is supplying pre-equipped to operate with electric locomotives on routes which are to be electrified at 25 kV 50 Hz. ISR placed a €122m order for the coaches in September 2012 under ...
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NewsEuropean Locomotive Leasing signs framework for 50 locomotives
EUROPE: New entrant to the leasing market European Locomotive Leasing has signed a framework contract to acquire up to 50 Siemens Vectron AC and multi-system locomotives. The agreement announced on March 31 includes a firm order for an undisclosed number of locomotives to be delivered immediately, with the rest to ...