This week’s round-up of business news from the UK railway industry.
To mark the Lunar New Year, South Western Railway has installed a Korean sign in a waiting room at New Malden station in southwest London, along with artwork featuring imagery of sculptures by leading Korean artist Meekyoung Shin. Cllr Robert Kim said New Malden was ’home to Europe’s largest Korean community, and this initiative demonstrates how diversity and democratic inclusiveness are not just values we speak about, but values we live. The partnership with South Western Railway shows how transport hubs can also become cultural spaces – bringing communities together and strengthening local pride.’
Network Rail is undertaking preliminary market engagement to gather industry insights on potential technologies and business models for enhanced movement limiting devices for rail plant. These would deliver a ’dynamic virtual wall’ capability during engineering works. Current high-performance movement limiting devices only function when road-rail vehicles operate on rail, and NR hopes to expand this to off-rail use, preventing vehicles or their loads from encroaching into open line clearances without physical barriers.
South Western Railway is planning to install at-seat power for customers within standard and first class accommodation on its Class 158 and 159 DMUs as part of the wider ongoing project to refurbish the fleet.
Resonate has appointed Camilla Gilchrist as Chief Operating Officer, overseeing client delivery, support functions and scalability across Resonate’s Initiate (access management), Luminate (traffic management) and Scalable (signalling control) products. She joins from Tractable where she was Chief of Staff & Director of Operations. Resonate CEO Blake Richmond said ‘Camilla brings deep operational leadership experience and proven ability to scale teams and processes in high-growth technology businesses.’
Rachel Crosier has joined the Projects and Rail practices at law firm Freeths from A&O Shearman. Crosier will work closely alongside partners James Larmour and Tom Johnson to support the firm’s growth in specialist PFI/PPP, major projects, and rail, transport and infrastructure sectors. Her work within rail includes advising on a rolling stock public-private partnerships, major fleet procurements, operational and maintenance arrangements, depot infrastructure and wider commercial and regulatory matters across UK and international markets. ‘PFI/PPP and wider complex infrastructure schemes continue to evolve, especially within the rail sector, where clients increasingly need advisers who can combine technical expertise with genuine sector insight’, she said.
A consortium of Jacobs, PA Consulting, QinetiQ, TNO, Iconal Technology, Cambridge University Technical Services Limited and Prometheus Policing Services has secured a four-year contract extension from the Department for Transport to continue leading the National Security Science & Research programme to demonstrate how government and industry can accelerate innovation to strengthen security and resilience across the rail, air and road networks.
Greater Anglia and the Ipswich to Cambridge Community Rail Partnership have launched a competition to find a promotional name for the line. ‘We are looking for a name that captures the essence of the area’, said Tracey Harding, Chair of the CRP. ‘We know reinforcing our local links with an appropriate name will help us strengthen ties with the local community and increase passenger numbers.’ The competition closes on March 12.
Marlene Pearson-McGrath has joined the Light Rail Safety & Standards Board as dedicated Head of Learning & Competence, She was previously Training Manager at Edinburgh Trams, and during a part-time secondment to LRSSB helped to develop a sector-wide online Skills Hub that aims to standardise competencies. This enables operators to keep track of required certifications and helps them identify appropriate training courses.