SWEDISH State Railways has lost another tender for the operation of subsidised passenger services from January 1 2000. On June 1 the state rail traffic office Rijkstrafiken selected the newly-formed Svenska Tågkompaniet to operate overnight services to the far north of Sweden and local services on the Luleå - Kiruna - Narvik Malmbanan.
Svenska Tågkompaniet has been formed by a group of former SJ managers who left following the appointment of Daniel Johannesson as Director-General last year. General Manager Jan Johansson and Operations Manager Sven Malmberg envisage a major improvement to the sleeper services, which currently handle around 500000 passengers/year. The present two overnight trains each way from Stockholm will be increased to three, and a through service to Umeå introduced to eliminate the change at Vännäs. Improvements to daytime services between Kiruna and Narvik are also envisaged next summer.
ST Marketing Manager Bj
