CONSTRUCTION was officially launched on the 113.5km Dunhua - Baihe high-speed line in China’s northeastern Jilin province on August 8.

THE autonomous region of Inner Mongolia joined China’s high-speed network on August 3 with the opening of the 126km Hohhot - Ulanqab section of the 287km Hohhot - Zhangjiakou high-speed line.

ITALIAN State Railways (FS) says traffic rose by 3% to 24 million journeys during the first half of 2017 on its 250 daily Frecce-branded services operated by Trenitalia comprising Frecciarossa and Frecciargento high-speed trains and Frecciabianca long-distance services.

THE first Stadler RABe 501 Giruno inter-city EMU for Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) began dynamic testing at the VUZ Velim test centre in the Czech Republic on July 24.

BRITAIN’s Department for Transport (DfT) has deposited a hybrid Bill in Parliament seeking powers to build Phase 2a of HS2 from Lichfield to Crewe, which is expected to open 2027, and has confirmed the alignment for Phase 2b from Crewe to Manchester and from Birmingham to Leeds.

BRITAIN’s secretary of state for transport Mr Chris Grayling announced on July 17 that civil works contracts worth £6.6bn have been awarded for three sections of the £22.2bn Phase 1 London - Birmingham - Lichfield HS2 high-speed project.

Under a new strategy made public at the end of May, SNCF is hoping to attract 15 million additional passengers to its high-speed network by 2020. SNCF Voyages CEO Rachel Picard explains to Kevin Smith how the railway plans to reach this ambitious target.

Preliminary works are now underway for the first phase of Britain’s HS2 project to build a 338km high-speed network linking London, Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds. David Briginshaw reviews progress on the £55.7bn scheme.

Momentum is building behind the ambitious Rail Baltica project, which aims to construct an 870km standard-gauge 240km/h mixed-traffic railway linking the Baltic state capitals with Poland and the broader European railway network. David Briginshaw reports from the Latvian capital Riga on progress so far.