All articles by Railway Gazette International – Page 1066
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News
High speed tenders
ON DECEMBER 26 Spanish infrastructure authority ADIF announced the award of two contracts to undertake civil works between Legutiano and Escoriatza on the Vitoria branch of the high speed network connecting it with Bilbao and San Sebasti?n.A 5?km section is to be built by a joint venture of Comsa and ...
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Hanoi tram revival underway
CHAIRMAN of the Hanoi People’s Committee Nguyen Quoc Trieu officially launched the construction of the first modern light rail line in the Vietnamese capital at a groundbreaking ceremony on December 27.Work began at the site of the maintenance depot and operations control centre in Tu Liem district, west of the ...
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Steel line handover
NIGERIA's first standard-gauge railway passed into private hands on January 11, when the 327 km Central Railway was transferred to Global Infrastructure Nigeria Ltd under a 20-year concession from the Bureau of Public Enterprises. Isolated from NRC's 1 067 mm gauge main lines, the Central Railway was conceived as an ...
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Third Railway Package goes to the vote
INTERNATIONAL passenger services in Europe are on course to be opened up to competition from 2010 following a vote in the European Parliament on January 18 after the second reading of the Third Railway Package. But a proposal supported by the Transport Committee for domestic services in the EU15 to ...
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PPP projects garner interest
PLANS TO finance French infrastructure projects through public-private partnerships are attracting attention, confirmed Transport Minister Dominique Perben on December 20, six days after RFF formally invited expressions of interest for its first scheme.The infrastructure manager is consulting on the PPP concession to design, install, operate and maintain GSM-R digital radio ...
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Glattalbahn opens its first section
TWO MOUNTAINS and a lake have long-constrained the city of Zürich. As a result, urban development has focused on the lower-lying areas towards the northeast, around the airport and the towns of the Glatt valley. These are served by several S-Bahn routes, but it became apparent during the 1990s that ...
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First leather seats
UK inter-city operator First Great Western has unveiled the first trailer coaches to be refurbished by Bombardier at its Derby plant under a £63m programme to overhaul the 53-strong IC125 HST diesel fleet. The first fully-refurbished trainset was officially unveiled with a Plymouth - London special train on January 17. ...
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First passengers ride Taiwan high speed line
TAIWAN High Speed Rail Corp began carrying fare-paying passengers on January 5, with the first train leaving Panchiao station near Taipei at 07.00 for the 345 km trip to Zuoying in the southern city of Kaohsiung. Tickets for the 90 min journey were offered at a 50% discount for travel ...
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TRAX expands
UTAH Transit Authority began work on January 8 to build a 1?6?km extension of Salt Lake City’s TRAX light rail network from the existing city-centre terminus to a new intermodal interchange where it will connect with the FrontRunner commuter rail route, Amtrak and both local and inter-city buses. Serving one ...
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EVR's private interlude is over
BALTIC Rail Services announced on January 9 that the sale of its 66% holding in Eesti Raudtee had been completed, ending five years of private-sector operation of the Estonian rail network. The move was followed by the appointment as Chief Executive of former infrastructure director Kaido Simmermann, who immediately ...
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Display of displays
INFOTEC’s LED Low Power Technology customer information displays will be linked to power meters to demonstrate the savings in energy costs which can be obtained through the use of energy- efficient displays.Also on show at Railtex will be LCD and TFT displays, as well as Infotec’s LED Low Power Technology ...
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Dieter
VolkerRail has sufficient staff for weekday work, but has found itself short of workers on weekends, when it is easier to obtain track possessions. To avoid this, the Dutch contractor is working with farmers’ organisation LTO Noord to recruit agricultural workers in the provinces of Utrecht, Gelderland and Overijssel, who ...
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Delays scrutinised
MORE TALES of woe reach us from the Netherlands, where Parliament has commissioned an independent investigation by the National Audit Office into the much-delayed HSL-Zuid and Betuwe Route projects.Trigger for the vote was the confirmation by Transport Minister Karla Peijs on Decem-ber 19 that services on HSL-Zuid would not start ...
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Cutting edge
WELDING and cutting equipment makers ESAB and Truflame will be exhibiting standard and automated tools, consumables and protective clothing on a joint stand. ESAB’s Railtrac BV semi-automatic rail and crossing repair welding machine will be on show, along with a Mobilemaster IV portable wire feed unit and OK15.43 gasless cored ...
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Crossing risk
WE HAVE commented before about the commercial threat to rail of introducing heavier lorries into Europe (RG 10.06 p641). But another risk was graphically demonstrated in Australia’s Northern Territory on December 12, when the northbound Ghan hit a road train on an open level crossing at Ban Ban Springs, ...
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Signalling under control
THE Union Switch & Signal Microlok Object Controller is a programmable microprocessor device used for vital or non-vital control and indication of lineside devices such as points, signals, or other equipment. The device was launched by US&S at the AusRail exhibition in Brisbane in November 2006 as a low cost ...
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Docklands Light Railway Stratford extension contract
TRANSPORT for London has awarded the first of three contacts covering construction of the 5 km extension of the Docklands Light Railway to Stratford International, which is scheduled to open in 2010. The Skanska-GrantRail joint venture is expected to begin work immediately on the £39m contract, which covers construction ...
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Israeli expansion continues
ISRAEL: On January 2 Israel Railways marked the start of construction of Ofakim station on the new direct line between Ashkelon and Beer-Sheva. Participating in the stone-laying ceremony were Transport Minister Shaul Mofaz, ISR General Manager Ofer Linchevsky and Mayor of Ofakim Avi Asraf. Costed at US$400m, the 63 km ...
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Leslys concession
INTERURBAN tram-train services linking Lyon with the airport and TGV station at Saint-Exup?ry are expected to start running in the autumn of 2009, following the signing of a 30-year concession to develop and operate the ?100m Leslys project (RG 10.02 p609).Conseil G?n?ral du Rh?ne has selected the RhonExpress consortium led ...
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Madrid expansion plan nears completion
SPAIN: The extension of Madrid Metro Line 11 from Pan Bendito to La Peseta in the southwestern suburb of Carabanchel opened to traffic on December 18 2006. With intermediate stations at San Francisco and Carabanchel Alto, the 2·7 km extension has cost €172m to build and is expected to be ...