UKRANIAN Railways (UZ) has signed a contract with Transmashholding and Lugansk Diesel Locomotive Plant, Ukraine, for the supply of 292 2EL4 electric locomotives, in a deal estimated to be worth up to $US 1.5bn. The locomotives will be delivered between 2012 and 2014, and Lugansk says it will be able to deliver up to 100 2EL4s per year to UZ.

PARIS Transport Authority subsidiary RATP Dev has acquired Stagecoach's Manchester light rail operation as part of its expansion in the British public transport market. The takeover of Stagecoach Metrolink Limited signals RATP's entry into the British light rail market, although the company is already Europe's third-largest light rail operator by traffic volume, and it is already active in the British bus market, taking over a further three bus operators in March this year.

GERMAN Rail (DB) says its profits for the first half of this year have surged by 34% to achieve an adjusted Ebit of Euros 1.1bn, compared with the first half of 2010. Revenue increased by 17.2% to Euros 18.9bn, which DB claims is the highest half-year turnover it has ever recorded. The increase of Euros 2.8bn is considerably more than the extra Euros 1.5bn it has earned following the takeover of Arriva. DB paid its first dividend to the federal government of Euros 500m.

Expansion at the South African port of Richards Bay is increasing the strain on the heavy-haul railway that feeds it from the north. But as John Batwell and Keith Barrow explain, construction of a short link with neighbouring Swaziland could provide the capacity needed to support this booming corridor.

 

SOUTH Africa's Gautrain commuter service will begin commercial operations on the newly-completed section between Johannesburg's Rosebank station and Hatfield station in Tshwane on August 2.

THE head of Shanghai Railway Bureau, Mr An Lusheng, said today that the fatal crash between two high-speed trains on July 23 on a viaduct near Wenzhou on the Ningbo - Xiamen line was due to design flaws in the signalling. He explained the signal protecting the first train which had come to halt following a lightning strike failed to turn from green to red allowing the following train to crash into the rear of the stationary train.

STATISTICS gathered by the International Union of Railway (UIC) for 2010 show an overall growth of 3.4% in tonne-km and 3.5% in passenger-km worldwide. This confirms the recovery in freight traffic following the slump of 2008-09, while passenger traffic declines in some countries were compensated by strong growth in India.

A TOTAL of 39 people died and 192 were injured on the evening of July 23 following a collision in China between two trains on a viaduct near Wenzhou on the coastal 250km/h line linking Ningbo and Xiamen. It is reported that train D3115, which had 1072 passengers on board, had stopped following a lightning strike when it was struck by the following train, D301, which was carrying 558 passengers. The impact caused the front four cars of D301 to fall off the viaduct on to the ground below, while the rear two cars of train D3115 were derailed. It is unclear why the signalling system failed to halt train D301 and prevent it from hitting train D3115.

PARIS Transport Authority (RATP) has exercised an option worth more than €300m for a further batch of 66 MF01 metro trains for Line 9 from a consortium of Alstom, Bombardier, and Areva.

GERMAN open-access passenger operator Hamburg-Köln-Express (HKX) today unveiled its new brand image and livery, confirming that it plans to launch services by the end of the year.