THE Australian government has allocated $A 95m ($US 90m) to Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC) to support investment in reliability and capacity upgrades on the Adelaide – Perth rail corridor.

WITH the signing of a 12-year agreement with Whitehaven Coal, Aurizon (formerly QR National) is preparing to significantly expand its coal operation in New South Wales from July 2014.

TRIALS have begun in Sydney of the new Opal contactless public transport smartcard system, which is being installed by the Cubic-led Pearl consortium under a $A 370m ($US 398m) contract awarded in May 2010.

THE future of the proposed Surat Basin Rail (SBR) project in southern Queensland is under a cloud after the consortium charged with building the link failed to act on its notice of intention to acquire land identified for construction of the corridor.

WITH the release of the final version of its NSW Long Term Transport Master Plan the New South Wales state government has announced that a new light rail line will be built through the centre of Sydney to serve the districts of Randwick and Kingsford.

KIWIRAIL has launched its refurbished Tranz Alpine passenger train which has been re-equipped with new passenger coaches built at the Hillside workshops in Dunedin.

FOLLOWING speculation that Pilbara iron-ore miner Fortescue Metals Group (FMG) was considering selling its rail infrastructure as a way of reducing its debt liabilities, the company has confirmed to The West Australian newspaper that it has opened up a data room for a small group of potential investors.

About one-third of Australia's 8000 or so public level crossings have active warning devices, while the remainder have only passive signs. With several projects underway to fit more level crossings with active devices, Peter Hughes, principal of the Derwent Group, Australia, looks at their benefits, and considers when they are not required.

A new system which uses the GPS tracking devices installed on KiwiRail's locomotive fleet is set to improve safety for New Zealand's track workers, as KiwiRail's project manager, Jonathan Wynands explains.

The Australian State of Victoria is to acquire an additional 40 VLocity dmu vehicles from Bombardier at a cost of more than $A 200m ($US 209m) to accommodate anticipated further growth in ridership on regional services.