List view / Grid view
26 September 2013 | By Thomas Silbersky, Director of Sales and Marketing Division, SJ
Competition on the Swedish railway is on the rise as new players enter the market. While procured rail traffic was exposed to competition in the early 1990s, the deregulation of commercial domestic traffic first began in 2007 and was only fully deregulated in 2010. Since then, SJ’s competition has grown…
Founded in 2011 by 15 Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) from across the parliamentary committees, Rail Forum Europe (RFE) is an international non-profit association that brings together EU decision-makers and the rail sector to achieve a better understanding of rail-related issues. RFE is currently supported by 20 full member…
26 September 2013 | By Paul Mazataud, Managing Director, Rail Freight Corridor 2 and Deputy Head of Development, RFF
By 10 November 2013, six of the nine rail freight corridors initially foreseen by the EU Regulation 913/2010 concerning a European network for competitive freight will become operational. Rail Freight Corridor 2 (RFC2) is one of them. These corridors are extremely ambitious and will lead to major changes for international…
26 September 2013 | By Jon Shaw, Senior Project Director for the AVENTRA platform and the Divisional Head of Engineering for Bombardier Rolling Stock Atlantic & Services
Bombardier Transportation prides itself on offering the broadest product portfolio in the rail industry and delivers innovative products and services that set new standards in sustainable mobility – conserving energy, protecting the environment and improving total train performance for passengers and operators. In an interview for Global Railway Review, Jon…
26 September 2013 | By Chris Baker, Director of the Birmingham Centre for Railway Research and Education
In very broad terms, railway aerodynamic effects increase in severity with the square of the speed of the train – and historically came to become of concern as the speed of passenger trains increased beyond around 100km/h. In the first instance, attention was paid to reducing the aerodynamic drag of…
Rolling Stock maintenance; Level Crossing safety; Alpine profile; Infrastructure maintenance; Signalling; and much more...
In this Level Crossing Safety supplement: Improving on improvements; Reducing fatalities – a high priority for Lithuanian Railways; Reducing fatalities – a worldwide issue (Isabelle Fonverne, Safety and Interoperability Projects Officer, UIC)...
In our latest free-to-view Rolling Stock Maintenance & Refurbishment supplement, Daniel Smith, Head of Engineering, Heathrow Express discusses how The 1991 Heathrow Express Railways act paved the way for BAA plc., plus Christian Daniel, Maintenance Organisation Director, SNCF explains how Methodology and organisation are essential issues for effective fleet management...
1 August 2013 | By Peter Füglistaler, Director of the Federal Office of Transport (FOT), Switzerland
One of the principal aims of Swiss transport policy is to transfer transalpine freight traffic from road to rail. This is why Switzerland has built the new flat-bed rail tunnels through the Alps and introduced a road charge for heavy goods vehicles. In order to further support this development, the…
1 August 2013 | By Renzo Simoni, CEO, AlpTransit Gotthard Ltd
Work on the Gotthard and Ceneri base tunnels is on course. In the Gotthard Base Tunnel between Erstfeld and Sedrun, the ballastless railway track has been laid in both tubes. In total, 45% of the railway infrastructure systems have been installed. A pilot operation between Faido and the south portal…
1 August 2013 | By Helga Labermeier, Scientific Specialist, Timetable Planning Department, SBB Infrastructure
The Swiss are world champions of rail travel. Every day, approximately 10,000 trains travel on Switzerland’s standard-gauge network which covers just over 3,665km. They take almost a million people to their destinations – safely and punctually – and transport 200,000 tonnes of freight. These impressive figures are unequalled anywhere else…
1 August 2013 | By Klaus Garstenauer, Head of Local and Regional Train Services, ÖBB-Personenverkehr AG
In early-2013, the Supervisory Board of ÖBB-Personenverkehr AG and ÖBB-Holding AG concluded an order worth approximately €581 million for 100 new Siemens Desiro ML mass transit and regional trains. The new trainsets will contribute significantly to improving passenger comfort and prove that ÖBB is committed to enhancing its offering. The…
1 August 2013 | By Erich Forster, CEO, WESTbahn Management GmbH
WESTbahn Management GmbH is a private railway company that launched operations in December 2011 offering passenger services between Vienna, Salzburg and Freilassing. We are the first private long-distance railway company in Austria, offering almost hourly intervals. Due to a top speed of 200km/h, the journey time of WESTbahn trains from…
1 August 2013 | By Michael Walter, Bernhard Knoll and Jürgen Stern, Business Unit Integrated Railroad Line Management, ÖBB-Infrastruktur AG
The liberalisation of European railways, particularly the free network access of passenger and freight traffic, have a basic influence on the construction of new lines and the maintenance and upgrading of tracks of ÖBBInfrastruktur AG. This article outlines the essential characteristics of track systems including track substructure. Line layout and…
1 August 2013 | By Peter Veit, Head of the Institute for Railway Engineering and Transport Economy, Graz University of Technology, Austria
Since 2002, track strategies at the Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB) have been based on life-cycle cost calculations1. These basic strategies have been adopted due to new technologies – for example the use of under sleeper pads, changing price levels, and the phenomena of rail contact fatigue2 (RCF). The basic data…
