Jeremaya Goldberg

ISRAEL's national transport, infrastructure and roads safety minister Mr Yisarel Katz has sharply criticised new finance minister Mr Yair Lapid's plans to cut the infrastructure budget, particularly that allocated to rail, as part of efforts to reduce the country's Shekels 39bn ($US 10.76bn) budget deficit.

PROVISIONAL traffic figures for December 2012 show that about 4 million Israelis travelled by train, which means that for the first time ever annual passenger traffic exceeded 40 million journeys.

A BIDDERS conference held in Tel Aviv today by NTA for a tender for a fleet of LRVs was attended by representatives from 22 companies from Israel and several European countries.

THE ISRAELI government has approved a Shekels 130m ($US 34m) investment in freight equipment with the aim of increasing railfreight volumes from seven million tonnes to 13.5 million tonnes within five years.

ISRAEL Railways (IR) has signed a cooperation agreement with the National Roads Company (NRC) for the electrification of the country's railway network, and issued an invitation to prequalify for the first phase of the project.

ISRAEL National Roads Company invites companies or groups to prequalify by October 24 for a contract to construct the superstructure, and equip two new lines currently under construction.

SPEAKING at a visit to view progress of construction on the Tel Aviv light metro, Israel's transport minister, Mr Yisrael Katz, said he will present a motion very soon to the government to build a rail network covering the entire Greater Tel-Aviv Area, known locally as the Dan Agglomeration.