AUBAGNE, a town of 46,000 inhabitants situated east of Marseille, inaugurated its first light rail line on September 1.
CHINA Railways Corporation (CRC) has reported a loss of Yuan 5.36bn ($US 870m) after tax for the first half of this year, compared with a profit of Yuan 2.57bn in the first half of 2013.
ROLLING stock leasor Eversholt Rail has awarded Alstom a £36.1m contract to refurbish its 40 class 334 EMUs operated by First ScotRail on services between Glasgow and Edinburgh via Bathgate.
NEW ZEALAND's national railway KiwiRail has posted losses of $NZ 248m ($US 208m) for the 2013-14 financial year, which ended on June 30 2014, compared with a deficit of $NZ 174m in the previous financial year.
THE French city of Besançon celebrated the inauguration of its first light rail line on August 30 with two days of festivities marking the completion of what is hailed by the city as the "lowest-cost tram line in France."
SWISS Federal Railways has awarded ABB Switzerland a contract worth around SFr 69.2m ($US 75.4m) to supply new traction equipment for its fleet of 119 Re460 electric locomotives as part of a SFr 230m mid-life refurbishment programme.
THE second light rail line in the French city of Le Mans was inaugurated on August 30 by the city's mayor Mr Jean-Claude Boulard, and member of parliament for Le Mans Mr Stéphane le Foll.
GERMAN Rail (DB) and French National Railways (SNCF) marked a milestone for international high-speed services between Germany and France on August 29, when they carried their 10 millionth passenger on their ICE and TGV services from Stuttgart and Frankfurt to Paris.
TANZANIA is in the process of securing an advisor for a $US 1bn public-private partnership (PPP) scheme to upgrade Tanzania Railways' (TR) 970km metre-gauge line linking Dar es Salaam with Dodoma, Tabora and Isaka.
OPTIONS for improving high-speed rail links to Italy's most important airports will be examined in more detail following the signing of an agreement between Italian State Railways (FS) and the Italian Ministry of Transport on August 26.
