AUSTRALIA: Invensys Rail Group announced on May 21 that Australian Rail Track Corp had awarded its Westinghouse Rail Systems Australia subsidiary a A$14m turnkey contract for signalling on the Southern Sydney Freight Line.
The SSFL project will provide a 36 km dedicated freight line between Macarthur and Sefton, removing a bottleneck by allowing freight trains to be operated independently of RailCorp's passenger services. Freight is currently not permitted on the shared tracks during peak passenger hours, and so freight trains cannot arrive or depart at optimum times.
'ARTC's tender specified delivery of a conventional interlocking solution using track circuits', said WRSA Managing Director Phil Ellingworth. 'WRSA proposed an alternative solution using service-proven signalling elements in an innovative architecture delivering optimal value to meet ARTC's key operational needs. It was this innovative engineering solution that won WRSA the tender in the end.'
