All News articles – Page 245
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News
Ticketing in Brief
DB and VDV have introduced City-Ticket, allowing passengers travelling over 100 km using a BahnCard to complete their journey by bus, tram and metro in 46 German cities without further payment. It is hoped to expand City-Ticket to all cities of over 120000 residents. The Ontario provincial government has allocated ...
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Industry News in Brief
Australia:Oz-Tek Solutions Pty is to manufacture under licence from North American Technologies Group a range of composite plastic sleepers up to 5·5m long, using a production line at a New South Wales factory owned by Nepean Rubber & Plastic.China:Sinopec Corp and China Railway Material & Supplies Corp have established Sinopec ...
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Bergen to start light rail tendering
BERGEN city council’s light rail project office, Bybanekontoret, expects to start prequalification next month for supply of vehicles to operate a projected two-line network in Norway’s second city. Subject to approval of funding by the national parliament, a contract should be awarded at the beginning of 2005. Plans for four ...
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BDZ faces change
LASTMONTH Bulgarian Transport Minister Nikolai Vassilev unveiled a package of 50 measures to revitalise the national railway operator BDZ. Restructuring of the railway’s management will result in 1280 redundancies among administrative staff this year. Routes totalling 308 km will be offered as concessions, and private operators will be allowed to ...
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Bangkok Blue line ready
PRINCESS Maha Chakri Sirindhorn of Thailand formally 'opened' the Blue line of the Bangkok metro on January 11, following successful completion of trial runs with a Siemens-built three-car trainset. Linking Hualampong and Bang Sue, the 22 km route is officially known as the Chaloem Ratchamongkhon line. Transport Minister Suriya ...
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Ballastless track design
ON DISPLAY at the Mena Rail event in Dubai in December was a slab track design developed by two German companies, Naumburger Bauunion and ThyssenKrupp GfT Gleistechnik. The suppliers said that NBU track was suitable for speeds of up to 220 km/h and also for light rail projects.The NBU track ...
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Perpignan - Figueres award
ON DECEMBER 26 the governments of France and Spain announced that TP Ferro has been selected as preferred bidder for the concession to design, finance, build and operate the 44·4 km route between Perpignan and Figueres. It was hoped to sign the 50-year concession contract within a matter of weeks, ...
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Australia's last frontier is conquered
John Kirk was in Adelaide to watch the departure of the first train to Darwin
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NEG wins Greater Anglia
LATE DECEMBER saw the UK Strategic Rail Authority make significant progress with negotiating replacements for several passenger train franchises. On December 22 SRA named National Express Group as preferred bidder for Greater Anglia. This combines the Anglia and Great Eastern franchises with the West Anglia portion of WAGN, bringing almost ...
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Regauging pushes ahead
INAUGURATING broad-gauge services on the reconstructed line between Mangalore and Kabakaputtur, Indian Railways Minister Nitish Kumar announced on December 28 that trains would be running on the whole Bangalore - Mangalore corridor by January 1 2005.Construction of the 166 km new line between Bangalore and Hassan has been completed (RG ...
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East Africa tests the waters
SERIOUS moves are afoot to take the metre-gauge networks of East Africa into the private sector. Last November CPCS Transcom and its local partner Kisarika & Malimi won a C$1·7m contract from the Tanzanian government to act as lead transaction advisors for the privatisation of Tanzania Railways Corp. The contract ...
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Suica card to be used across Tokyo
BYLINE: Shinobu NoguchiDeputy General Manager, Suica Project,East Japan Railway CoINTRO: Adoption of Suica-compatible cards by 53 operators in the Tokyo area in 2006 will form the world’s largest public transport smart card network, doubling the number of Suica users to around 15 millionBY the end of November 2003 over 7·5 ...
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Shenzhen signs Line 4 deal
HONG KONG metro operator MTR Corp signed a 30-year agreement in principle on January 15 to extend and operate Line 4 of the metro network in neighbouring Shenzhen. The BOT deal was signed by MTR Chief Executive Chow Chung-Kong and Liu Jiasheng of the Shenzhen Municipal Development Planning Bureau. Under ...
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Line 11 opens
ON DECEMBER 14 Line 11 of the Barcelona metro was officially opened, running from Line 4 at Trinitat Nova to Can Cuiàs via Casa de l’Aigua, Torre del Baró-Vallbona and Ciutat Meridiana. The line has 1·5 km in tunnel and 459m on the surface; there is an interchange with Renfe ...
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Ticketless Thalys
THALYS is to introduce paperless ticketing for frequent-traveller card holders. From early 2004 regular passengers will be able to book over the internet or by telephone, simply presenting their chipcards during ticket checks, according to General Manager Frank Bernard. In addition, the Thalys trainsets will have Wi-Fi servers for on-board ...
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Wheel/Rail Safety
Edited by Professor Roger LundénTHIS October 2003 special edition (Volume 26, Number 10) of the monthly journal Fatigue & Fracture of Engineering Materials & Structure contains 15 articles on research into the wheel-rail interface, with a particular emphasis on the rail. Three introductory articles provide an overview of rail defects, ...
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Pre-cast platforms
STATION platforms can be assembled quickly and easily using the Fast Build range of pre-cast components recently launched by Bell & Webster Concrete. The basic parts comprise four identical base units, a platform unit, ground beams and infill panels. These form a 4m by 3m module which can be assembled ...
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Productivity must rise
In a keynote presentation to CEE 2003, Hungarian State Railways’ General Director Zolt
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ORR sets NR spending limits
NETWORK Rail must be allowed to spend £22·2bn on operating, maintaining and upgrading the UK’s national network over the next five years, Rail Regulator Tom Winsor ruled on December 12. His decision follows research and consultation by the Office of the Rail Regulator, and provides around £10bn less than NR ...
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Letters
Intransigence holds up freight progressSir - You report that Eurotunnel has applied to the French transport ministry for a licence to operate trains in France (RG 11.03 p724), and also that SNCF is reorganising its freight business to be more commercial (RG 12.03 p765). But you make no mention in ...