THE Port of Bordeaux Authority has awarded Eurotunnel subsidiary Europorte Socorail an eight year contract to operate and maintain railway infrastructure in the port area.

CHANNEL Tunnel operator Eurotunnel achieved a 14% increase in revenue to €473m in the six months up to June 30.

AFTER several attempts to increase the volume of mail transported by rail, most of them unsuccessful, the United States Postal Service (USPS) is once more eyeing rail as means of reducing costs and improving efficiency.

THE SPANISH government is expected to vote at the end of this month on draft legislation that could bring sweeping liberalisation of the rail market within a year together with the privatisation of Renfe.

RIFT Valley Railways (RVR), the consortium operating Kenya and Uganda's railways, has announced a $US 62m investment plan to buy new wagons and to rehabilitate its existing fleet.

BRITAIN's prime minister Mr David Cameron has announced plans today to invest an additional £4.2bn to upgrade key sections of the rail network in England and Wales between 2014 and 2019 on top of the £5.2bn already committed for projects currently underway such as Crossrail and Thameslink.

SIEMENS has been awarded a contract to supply 13 1067mm-gauge 25kV heavy-haul electric locomotives to the BHP Billiton Mitsubishi Alliance (BMA), which will be used on coal trains in Queensland from 2014 onwards.

TRANSNET, South Africa, revealed impressive results for the 2011-12 financial year on July 10, and pledged that even in the worst economic scenario, it will proceed with the bulk of its Rand 300bn ($US 26bn) capital investment programme.

Following the successful introduction of a scheduled intermodal shuttle between Zürich Dietikon and Lausanne Renen at the beginning of this year, Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) railfreight subsidiary SBB Cargo has announced plans to develop a national network of intermodal shuttles.

ANSALDO STS Australia has won two contracts worth a total of $A 362m ($US 371m) to supply signalling systems for Rio Tinto's heavy-haul iron-ore operations in Australia.