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STOCKHOLM Local Transport (SL) has selected Euromaint Rail, Sweden, for a SKr 400 million ($US 51.9 million) contract to refurbish the fleet of three-car emus used on the 891mm-gauge Roslagsbanan.

ALGERIA'S national rail development authority Anesrif has selected a joint venture of FCC, Spain and Algerian partner ETRHB Haddad to build a new line serving the region south of Algiers.

 

BRITISH infrastructure manager Network Rail has awarded Balfour Beatty three trackwork contracts worth at least £133 million.
A four-year extension of Balfour Beatty's existing track renewal framework agreement to 2014 is worth around £56 million. A further £115 million extension could be awarded if targets are met within the first year of the contract, which covers plain line and switch renewals, together with associated signalling, electrification and drainage work, in NR's South East territory.

RUSSIA's Sapsan high-speed service between Moscow and St Petersburg transported more than 411,000 passengers in its first four months of operation, recording an 85% occupancy rate between December and March. Despite Russian Railways (RZD) doubling frequency from three trains a day to five in April, the service retained an occupancy rate of 84.7% with 123,600 passengers travelling during the month.

TOUGH economic conditions and a reduction in road tolls have had a negative impact on the revenues of Japan's three largest railways, which all saw their income decline in the 2009-10 financial year.

Despite the failure of December’s United Nation’s COP15 climate change conference in Copenhagen to achieve a binding agreement, the Train to Copenhagen campaign organised to coincide with the summit was a success. UIC’s sustainable development coordinator Henning Schwarz and senior advisor for sustainable development Margrethe Sagevik talk to Kevin Smith about the UIC’s work to promote rail’s environmental credentials.

 

PAKISTAN'S Ministry of Railways is set to resurrect the Karachi Circular Railway (KCR) eleven years after it closed. The Japanese government has agreed to provide a Rs 128.6 billion ($US 1.53 billion) loan to fund the revitalisation of the three-line, 121km railway which opened in two phases in 1964 and 1970.

MAJOR changes are happening in both supply and operations which will have a profound effect on the shape of the railway industry over the next few years. A shake-up of the key railway equipment suppliers is underway which will increase competition, while paradoxically in Europe the large remaining state-owned railways are steadily swallowing up private operators to create a few European monoliths which pose a threat to open-access and competition.

 

Go! Cooperative, the latest prospective member of Britain’s growing portfolio of open-access operators, is taking a slightly different approach from those that have set up and maintained successful operations in the past. Kevin Smith reports on the plans of Britain’s first cooperative train company as it aims to begin operations in December 2011.