GOVIA Thameslink Railway (GTR) has awarded Bombardier a £145.2m contract to supply 27 four-car class 387/2 Electrostar EMUs for London Victoria – Gatwick Airport Gatwick Express services.

CANADIAN Pacific announced on November 17 that its Delaware & Hudson Railway (D&H) subsidiary has agreed to sell a 455km section of its network in the northeastern United States to Norfolk Southern (NS) for $C 217m ($US 192.6m).

THE newly-elected mayor of Surrey, the second-largest city in the Canadian province of British Columbia, has pledged to construct the city's first light rail line within four years.

HYUNDAI-ROTEM, Korea, is to establish a rolling stock assembly plant in Brazil under an agreement with the government of the state of São Paulo, which was signed at Bandeirantes Palace on November 12 in the presence of the state's recently re-elected governor Mr Geraldo Alckmin.

THE first 1520mm-gauge trials of Alstom's NBT slab track system began on November 15, when testing was launched at the VNIIZhT test centre at Shcherbinka near Moscow in the presence of Russian Railways (RZD) senior vice-president Mr Valentin Gapanovich.

TAIPEI celebrated the opening of the 8.5km eastern extension of metro Line 3 from Ximen to Songshan on November 15 with a day of reduced fares and free rides for holders of the city's EasyCard contactless smartcard.

MEXICO City Public Transport System (STC) has awarded Alstom Transport Mexico a Pesos 5.8bn ($US 343m) contract to modernise 85 rubber-tyred trains, which are used on metro lines 4, 5, 6, 7, and B.

LATVIA Railways (LDZ) has awarded a contract to Rolls-Royce for 28 MTU engines to power 14 class 2M62U locomotives which are to be rebuilt by CZ Loco, Czech Republic.

FOUR Indonesian banks have agreed to lend the country's national railway PT Kereta Api Rupiahs 2.38 trillion ($US 195.5m) to help increase capacity on the Jabodetabek commuter rail network serving Jakarta and neighbouring cities.

THE Egyptian Ministry of Finance has transferred $US 2.4bn to the National Authority for Tunnels (NAT) to expand the metro and purchase trains.