Keith Barrow

BASLE Transport Authority celebrated a milestone in its largest-ever procurement of new vehicles on September 4 with the delivery of the first of 60 Flexity low-floor LRVs from Bombardier's Bautzen plant in eastern Germany.

TURKISH State Railways (TCDD) has awarded Indra, Spain, a €43m contract to supply a traffic management and network planning system covering 12,000km of conventional and high-speed lines.

BALFOUR BEATTY announced on September 3 that it has sold its engineering and design consultancy subsidiary Parsons Brinckerhoff (PB) to WSP Global, Canada, for £820m ($US 1.35bn).

THE WORLD's largest rolling stock manufacturers CNR and CSR have suspended trading of their shares following reports in the Chinese media that the Chinese government is looking to merge the two companies.

DB SCHENKER and Zhengzhou International Land Port Development and Construction Company launched a new direct Germany – China freight service on September 1, when the first train was flagged off from the Billwerder terminal in Hamburg by Dr Karl-Friedrich Rausch, DB management board officer for logistics and the governor of Hunan province Mr Xie Fuzhan.

FOLLOWING a European tender, Lower Saxony Transport Authority (LNVG) has awarded DB Regio a contract to operate the Lower Saxony Diesel network for 15 years from December.

NORWAY and Sweden have agreed to draw up a joint strategy for the development of rail traffic on the Oslo – Gothenburg corridor following a meeting between representatives of Sweden's Industry Ministry and the Norwegian ministry of transport in Stockholm on August 27.

TRANSDEV is to continue operating Dublin's Luas tram network for another five years under a €150m contract signed on September 2 by Ireland's National Transport Authority (NTA), the Railway Procurement Agency (RPA), and Transdev Dublin Light Rail.

SAUDI Railways Organisation (SRO) has awarded a Riyals 6m ($US 1.6m) contract to a consortium of Spanish consultants led by Consultrans to study options for a high-speed line linking Riyadh and Dammam.

THE inauguration of the light rail network in Besançon on August 30 was notable not only because it brings trams back to this French city of 115,000 inhabitants for the first time in 62 years but also because it shines a spotlight on what it costs to build a tram network, and most importantly, how smaller cities can do the job for less.