All articles by Railway Gazette International – Page 1352
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News
Customer centre opens
FASTER, BETTER and more cost effective management of freight services was promised by Swiss Federal Railways President Benedikt Weibel on May 25, when he inaugurated SBB Cargo’s new customer service centre (KSC) at Freiburg. Built at a cost of SFr22m, the centre will provide a single point of contact for ...
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Image processing checks wheels
ENGINEERS at the Taiyuan Railway Research Institute of Science & Technology in China have developed a system that uses image processing to measure wheel profiles in motion at speeds between 3 km/h and 6 km/h. Activated by a photoelectric switch, the trackside system illuminates the wheel with a slit light ...
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Chinese east-west corridor starts
ON MAY 29 Chinese Railways officially inaugurated construction work on the 1129 km east-west trunk line between Nanjing and Xi’an, serving the Yangtze river valley. The line is a key part of the Ministry of Railway’s new strategy to open up corridors to western China (RG 4.00 p202). The intention ...
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Europe's freight wall cracks
NINE years after European transport ministers gingerly opened the gate to liberalised rail services with the signing of Directive 91/440 in Luxembourg, open access entrepreneurs and companies with substantial rail business are starting to exploit the opportunities. As well they might, given that the International Union of Combined Road-Rail Transport ...
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CTRL tunnel holed through
BRITAIN’s Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott was the principal guest at a holing-through ceremony in the 3·2 km North Downs Tunnel on the 74 km Section 1 of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link on June 7. Railtrack Chief Executive Gerald Corbett also attended.Speaking before a roadheader broke through the final ...
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Roissy-CDG link deal
ON JUNE 13 the presidents of French National Railways, Réseau Ferré de France and Aéroports de Paris signed an agreement to develop a high-speed rail link to Roissy-Charles-de-Gaulle Airport (RG 4.00 p205). The three companies have set up a Groupement d’Intérêt économique known as CDG-Express, which will be headed by ...
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The Øresund fixed link: a job well done
BYLINE: Sven LandeliusManaging Director, Øresundsbro KonsortietFollowing a five-year construction period, the Øresund fixed link between Denmark and Sweden will open on July 1 2000. It is with great satisfaction that my colleagues and I can look back on a job well done. We have managed to plan, construct and finish ...
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East and west
VISITING Spain last month with President Vladimir Putin, Russian Minister of Railways Nikolai Aksyonenko travelled to the Las Matas premises of Patentes Talgo to sign an agreement for a joint Spanish-Russian company. Destined to build gauge-convertible rolling stock for services between Russia and countries west of Belarus, the company will ...
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Regional rail services will strengthen economic ties
INTRO: Specially-built trains are spearheading the development of local passenger services across the Øresund link. Danish State Railways and Swedish State Railways have pooled their resources with the aim of growing the business to 4·8 million passengers a year by 2005BYLINE: Bjørn WahlstenHead of Passenger DivisionDanish State RailwaysINTEGRATING the ...
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Eurostar escape
FEW PEOPLE would dispute that the 501 passengers and 16 crew on Eurostar 9047 from Paris to London on June 5 had a lucky escape when their train derailed at around 250 km/h at Croisilles on the TGV Nord line near Arras in northern France. No-one was seriously hurt, but ...
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New York freight tunnel favoured
CONSTRUCTION of a rail tunnel under New York harbour has been recommended by a study into improved freight links around New York City. The study also recommended the revival of car floats to carry wagons across the harbour. Only one barge operation remains, and its market share is tiny. Much ...
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FEVE launches second Transcant
SPANISH metre-gauge operator FEVE has introduced a second rake for its Transcant
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Finance
Great Britain: Anglia Railways has signed a leasing agreement with HSBC Rail covering 13 Class 86 locomotives, 93 MkII coaches and 13 driving trailers until the end of the current franchise in 2004. The lease includes a C2 overhaul programme worth £14m to be completed by the end of 2000.Singapore: ...
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Five more years of maglev tests needed
CENTRAL JAPAN Railway has announced a ’technical development plan’ for its superconducting maglev test line near Ohtsuki in Yamanashi prefecture. JR Central says that the Maglev Technological Practicality Evaluation Committee concluded in March that ’the Superconducting Maglev technology has the practicality for an ultra-high-speed mass transport system’, but it is ...
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Fledgling MThB spreads its wings
INTRO: Using open access rights available under the 1999 Swiss railway reform, Mittelthurgau Railway is rapidly expanding its freight activities in partnership with other railways and businesses. Its innovative and flexible approach has taken competitors by surpriseBYLINE: Dr Ursula WidmerDeputy Director, Mittelthurgau RailwayWHEN THE Swiss Parliament promulgated laws authorising the ...
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Israelis flock to the trains
RECORDS are tumbling month by month as passenger traffic continues to boom on Israel Railways. Director-General Amos Uzani announced on June 12 that for the first time more than 1 million passengers had been carried in May, a 50% rise on May 1999. In the first five months of this ...
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Single route grows into a network
WHEN the 471 km AVE line from Madrid to Sevilla opened on April 20 1992, high-speed rail travel was a novelty for Spain. Who dreamt then that Spain would now be committed to construction of a national high-speed network? Yet work on Madrid - Barcelona route is well advanced and ...
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Hannover S-Bahn opens
GERMAN Railway officially launched its latest S-Bahn network in Hannover on May 27, ahead of the start of public services with the summer timetable change the following day. It accounts for around DM1·6bn of the DM2bn investment made by DB and the Land of Nidersachsen in preparation for the opening ...
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Industry News
Europe: Engineering consultancies Holland Railconsult and TransTeC of Germany have agreed to co-operate in their respective domestic markets and elsewhere.Malaysia: Time Salam Engineering has been purchased by Noblemax Resources for 18m ringgits. Now known as Emrail Sdn Bhd, the company undertakes the design and construction of trackwork, signalling and civils, ...
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Industry News
France: After making a loss of Fr81·7m in 1998, Arbel-Fauvet-Rail has reported a profit of Fr2·3m on a turnover of Fr596m for 1999, due in part to increased productivity at its Douai plant following restructuring. The AFR product range now includes a freight bogie for axleloads of 25 tonnes.Great Britain: ...