Keith Fender

GERMAN open-access operator Hamburg-Köln-Express (HKX), owned by Railroad Development Corporation (RDC), United States, is to suspend completely operation of its Hamburg - Cologne service between October 4 and December 10.

THE Karlsruhe - Basle main line in southwest Germany, one of Europe’s key rail freight arteries, has been closed since August 12 following a major earth movement caused by groundwater entering the construction site of the new 4.27km tunnel being built under Rastatt.

SPEAKING in Rennes at the inauguration of the new high-speed line from Le Mans to the city, new French president Mr Emmanuel Macron made it clear that his government will prioritise improvements to “daily everyday transport” and rather than new major projects invest in maintenance to overcome backlogs affecting rail, road and waterway networks in France.

GERMAN Rail (DB) is offering its fleet of class 120.1 and 120.2 electric locomotive fleet for sale to new owners.

THE fleet of Bombardier class 345 Aventra EMUs for London’s east-west Crossrail link carried their first passengers on June 22, when the trains entered commercial service with TfL Rail between London Liverpool Street and Shenfield.

HITACHI Rail Italy invited representatives of the media, Great Western Railway (GWR) and leasing company Eversholt Rail to its Pistoia plant on May 23 to view progress with the new fleet of class 802 inter-city trains for services from London to Devon and Cornwall.

GERMAN Rail (DB) and Siemens have agreed terms to further amend a contract originally signed in 2011 for 85 10-car and 45 seven-car 250km/h ICE 4 trains.

DB Long Distance has announced that it is investing €210m to refurbish its fleet of 66 ICE3 high-speed trains, comprising 50 class 403 15kV ac and 16 class 406 multi-system sets.

STADLER announced that it will form a joint venture with Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB) to take over maintenance of the Kiss EMU fleet used by open-access competitor Westbahn.