THE merger of Siemens’ mobility business and Alstom reached a milestone on March 23 with the signing of a Business Combination Agreement (BCA) setting out terms and conditions agreed by the two companies for the combination.

GOVIA Thameslink Railway (GTR), in cooperation with Britain’s infrastructure manager Network Rail (NR) and Siemens, is claiming a world first by running the first train in passenger service on the central-London section of Thameslink using ATO over ETCS.

FRAPORT, which operates Frankfurt Airport, has awarded a contract to a consortium of Siemens, Max Bögl Group and Keolis to build, operate and maintain a new fully-automated Airval peoplemover to serve the new Terminal 3.

NORWAY’s ERTMS programme reached an important milestone on March 14, when the board of infrastructure manager Bane Nor voted to award contracts to Siemens and Alstom for the rollout of ETCS Level 2 Baseline 3 across most of the 4114km national network by 2034.

INDIAN Railways (IR) has received five bids from international suppliers for a contract worth around Rs 50bn ($US 800m) to supply 200 6.7MW electric locomotives for the 1534km Western Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC).

FOLLOWING a tender launched in 2016, Danish State Railways (DSB) has selected Siemens to supply 26 Vectron dual-voltage locomotives with an option for an additional 18 units. A contract cannot be awarded until DSB receives approval from the Parliamentary Finance Committee.

THE design for new X-car six-car trains for the Vienna U-Bahn was presented on March 9 by the city’s environment councillor Ms Ulli Sima, Wiener Linien and Siemens.

GERMAN Rail (DB) has inaugurated its first digital interlocking (DSTW) at Annaberg-Buchholz, on the Chemnitz - Cranzahl line in southeastern Germany.

ISRAEL Railways (IR) and Siemens signed a contract worth more than $US 1bn on March 7 for the delivery of 60 Desiro HC regional EMUs over the next 10 years.

SINGAPORE’s Land Transport Authority (LTA) has awarded a €90m contract to Siemens to install communications-based train control (CBTC) for the 2.2km extension to the Downtown Line 3 from Expo to Sungei Bedok.