FRENCH National Railways (SNCF) says it will invest what it describes as an unprecedented amount this year to expand and modernise its passenger fleet and facilities. It plans to spend €2.6bn on the procurement of new trains, the refurbishment of existing trains, and improvements to stations.

RAIL.ONE, Germany, is to supply more than 530,000 bi-block concrete sleepers from its Rheda 2000 ballastless track system for installation on the 230km Honam high-speed line in Korea.

After a slow start, high-speed rail in India began to make the headlines last year as firm proposals for the first lines started to form. While a political head of steam is building up, Raghav Thakur questions whether the money is available to fund high-speed rail projects.

Despite a two-year setback due to corruption scandals and the fatal Wenzhou accident, China is on course to complete its 18,000km national high-speed rail network by 2015 as planned. Han Qiao from China Features in Beijing investigates the current state of play for the world's largest high-speed network.

The first phase of a major upgrade of the Chicago - St Louis corridor through the heart of Illinois is complete. And with work continuing to finish the entire project by 2017, the line is considered a bellwether for future improvements to freight corridors that carry passenger services in the United States, as Kevin Smith and Railway Age managing editor Douglas John Bowen discover.

Austria celebrated the opening of the new line from Vienna to St Pölten last month. While passenger journey times have been slashed, freight traffic is suffering from some early teething problems, as Erwin Reidinger reports.

SPAIN celebrated the completion of Iberia's first high-speed connection with the rest of Europe on January 8 with the inauguration of the 131km line between Figueres and Barcelona, which completes the 804km high-speed line between Madrid and the French border.

ITALIAN open-access high-speed operator NTV announced the results for its first eight months of operation on January 7, revealing it carried more than 2 million passengers on its Italo services from its launch on April 28 to the end of December.

AMTRAK is planning to formally request revisions to United States Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) safety standards to facilitate the introduction of standard lightweight high-speed trains, a move US rail advocates have sought for at least two decades.

BETWEEN Yuan 600bn ($US 92.52bn) and Yuan 650bn will be invested in China's national railway in 2013, while Yuan 1.8 trillion will be spent on railway construction during the 2013-2015 period.