All articles by Railway Gazette International – Page 1020
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News
Loco roll-out
USA: Pennsylvania-based mining and industrial locomotive builder Brookville Equipment Corp has unveiled the first of 16 BL20GH diesels it is supplying for freight and commuter services in the New York area. Six are for Connecticut Department of Transportation, six for Metro North and four for use on Staten Island. The ...
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Rolling stock market
Angola: Through Rites India's Integral Coach Factory has supplied two 1 067 mm gauge six-car DMUs, and three self-propelled accident response vehicles. Australia: In January Fortescue Metals placed an order for a further 160 iron ore wagons with China South. 816 were supplied under a previous order. Austria: Wiener Lokalbahnen ...
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HighJet to compete with Czech Pendolinos
CZECH REPUBLIC: Student Agency has announced plans to launch a privately-operated Praha - Ostrava inter-city service by 2011. SA intends to purchase six electric trainsets from Siemens or Stadler for KC2bn, according to Chairman Radim Jancura. Branded HighJet, the yellow-liveried trains will run in direct competition with Czech Railways' flagship ...
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Union Pacific boosts spending
USA: Union Pacific announced on February 1 that its board had approved a capital investment budget of $3·1bn for 2008. Of this, no less than $1·6bn will go on maintenance and upgrading of infrastructure, plus a further $840m to increase network and terminal capacity. UP plans to invest $490m on ...
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Birmingham New Street station rebuild funded
UK: Transport Secretary Ruth Kelly announced on February 12 that the Birmingham Gateway project to reconstruct the city's New Street station had obtained the funding needed to proceed. Work is planned to start in 2009 for completion by 2014. The Department for Transport will contribute £288m; another £100m will come ...
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Indian Railways invests
INDIA: Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh officiated at a ceremony in Jhabua on February 8 to lay the foundation stone for two new railways serving the western part of Madhya Pradesh. Joined by the state's Governor Balram Jakhar and Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, the Prime Minister inaugurated work on ...
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NewsHeavy haul developments
AUSTRALIA: Fortescue Metals subsidiary The Pilbara Infrastructure has lodged an application with Australia's National Competition Council seeking access to Rio Tinto's Robe River heavy haul line. TPI is seeking to operate trains over 210 km of track between Mesa J and Cape Lambert, with a view to enabling third parties ...
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Cork commuter reinstatement
IRELAND: Transport Minister Noel Dempsey officially launched works to reinstate the disued Glounthaune - Midleton line on February 14. A DMU service to Cork will be introduced in early 2009, running half-hourly in the peaks and hourly off-peak as part of a €130m investment in the city's commuter services under ...
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Cajon Pass: From double to triple-track
A massive capacity expansion project on BNSF’s busy Cajon Pass line is due to be completed by the end of this year. David Lustig reports from California
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Dulles deal halted
USA: Federal funding is unlikely to be forthcoming for the 18·7 km first stage of the Washington Metro extension towards Dulles International Airport. Federal Transit Administrator James Simpson insisted there are 'an extraordinarily large set of challenges' that would exclude the project from receiving $900m in federal grants. FTA had ...
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'Mixed train' approach can lift wagonload profitability
As Europe's traditional trainload traffic becomes less profitable, railways are keen to exploit ways of making wagonload operations more efficient. Combining wagonload and trainload traffic in 'mixed trains' can be an attractive option, as Sweden's Green Cargo has found
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NewsCzech passenger reform
CZECH REPUBLIC: On January 9 the government approved in principle the Ministry of Transport's plans to hive off the passenger division of Czech Railways as a wholly-owned subsidiary company. The Ministry will complete detailed studies by the end of October, and the restructuring is to be completed by the end ...
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New Chairman at CD
Petr Zaluda has been appointed Chairman & General Manager of Czech Railways (CD). He replaces Josef Bazala, who recently became Chairman & General Manager of CD Cargo (RG 1.08 p17). Educated in Brno, Petr Zaluda studied management, marketing and information technology at the University of Utrecht and Sheffield Business School ...
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BC proposes Vancouver transport plan
CANADA: The Premier of British Columbia Gordon Campbell announced a C$14bn transport plan which includes new metro, light rail and bus rapid transit lines on January 14. The biggest project is a 12 km SkyTrain light metro line running parallel to congested Broadway, bisecting central Vancouver to the University of ...
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NewsWraps come off the AGV
Built by Alstom on a speculative basis, the seven-car AGV demonstrator was unveiled to French President Nicolas Sarkozy on February 5. Murray Hughes reports from La Rochelle
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Helping business-led railways to share best practice
If there is one thing that we have learned during the past 20-year maelstrom of railway reform, restructuring, liberalisation, concessioning and privatisation, it is that today's railway managers need to keep a firm focus on the commercial aspects of their business. For operators such as the Class I railroads of ...
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News
Try, try again
GEORGIA: Despite, or perhaps because of, parliamentary elections in May, the government has embarked on another attempt to privatise Georgian Railways. Bids were invited by January 25, although no structure or timetable had been set for the process. Last year the Caucasian republic tried handing a 99-year concession to UK-based ...
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Denver places $184m order
USA: Siemens announced its largest-ever US light rail vehicle contract on February 5, a $184m deal to supply 55 SD160 high-floor cars to Denver's Regional Transportation District. RTD has previously ordered a total of 95 LRVs from Siemens. The initial seven vehicles from an option for 34 SD160 cars are ...