ESTONIA’s Ministry of Public Administration approved the spatial plan for the Rail Baltica high-speed line in Estonia on February 14 thereby completing the final route and preliminary design of the entire railway in the three Baltic states.
SLOVENIAN Railways (SŽ) has closed the bidding process for the sale of a 49% stake in its rail freight unit Tovorni Promet.
AUSTRALIAN rail freight operator Aurizon has confirmed that it will withdraw its application to the federally-managed Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility (NAIF) for funding to assist with a rail solution associated with development of the Galilee Basin coal mining region in North Queensland.
A new express rail freight service which promises delivery times of 28 hours between the Latvian capital Riga and the Belarussian capital Minsk completed a second test journey this week following an inaugural trip between Minsk and Riga in January.
A feasibility study into the construction of a rail tunnel under the Baltic Sea between the Finnish capital Helsinki and the Estonian capital Tallinn estimates the cost of the project at €13-20bn.
UNION Pacific Railroad (UP) has launched construction of its new Brazos Yard in Texas, which will become one of the highest-capacity yards on the company’s 23-state network when it opens in 2020.
RAIL Baltica invited bids on January 26 for a tender for detailed technical design of the first sections of the standard-gauge new railway in Latvia. Closing date for bids is February 28.
POLISH broad-gauge railway PKP LHS signed a Zlotys 121m (36.2m) loan agreement with the European Investment Bank on January 25, which will help finance a Zlotys 300m programme of infrastructure enhancements.
NORFOLK Southern announced on January 24 that it will implement a capital programme of $1.845bn in 2018, continuing what the railway describes as a balanced deployment of capital.
RZD Logistics and its Vietnamese partner, Ratraco, which is 35%-held by Vietnam Railways (VR), have successfully completed a test intermodal rail freight service between the Vorsino Freight Village, southwest of Moscow, and Hanoi.
