BOMBARDIER confirmed on July 3 that Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB) has exercised a €188m option for 25 six-car Talent 3 EMUs for regional services in the province of Tyrol.

SWISS Federal Railways (SBB) has launched work on a SFr 4.4m ($US 4.4m) maintenance hall for passenger trains in Brig with a ground breaking ceremony on June 26.

THE government of the state of Mato Grosso in the centre-west region of Brazil has announced a tender to resume the light rail project in Cuiabá, which was originally due to open in time for the 2014 football World Cup.

DYNAMIC testing of the first CAF class 397 ‘Nova 2’ EMU for British train operator TransPennine Express (TPE) began on the inner circuit at the VUZ Veilm test centre in the Czech Republic on the afternoon of July 3.

US regional and shortline railway operator Watco is set to expand its Australian operations after signing a contract with grain marketer and handler GrainCorp to operate its trains in the state of Queensland.

TRANSPORT for Greater Manchester (TfGM) has awarded a consortium of Bombardier UK and Kiepe Electric a £72m contract to supply 27 additional M5000 high-floor LRVs to boost capacity on the city’s Metrolink light rail network.

THE Netherlands government has decided to reconstruct and expand Amsterdam Central and Amsterdam South stations in order to improve accessibility to the Dutch capital and increase the capacity of the city’s rail network.

BYBANEN, the public company responsible for overseeing the 20km light rail line in Bergen, signed an eight-year contract with Keolis Norge on June 29 for the operation of the system and maintenance of its LRV fleet.

THE government of the Austrian province of Styria has announced plans to modernise the 65km narrow-gauge Mur Valley Railway from Unzmarkt to Tamsweg after proposals to convert the line to standard gauge were rejected on cost grounds.