Plans for an opening ceremony on October 31 were cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic. Rhine-Ruhr Transport Authority funded €44.8m of the cost of the project.
Australia: The Tonsley line in Adelaide, New South Wales, will close for two weeks from November 20 for essential testing and driver training in advance of the opening of the $A 140m ($US 101.7m) Flinders Railway Line in early December.
The project involves the construction of a 650m extension to the Tonsley rail line, including 520m of elevated single-track line over a major highway, the removal of the existing Tonsley Station and construction of a new station near Flinders Medical Centre and Flinders University.
India: Seven bidders have declared their interest in the lead consultancy role for Chennai’s 26km metro Line 4, which will run east-west from Poonamallee to Lighthouse. The bidders include Nippon Koei, Japan; Systra, France; Egis Rail, France; Germany’s DB Engineering and Consulting; Indian state-owned firm Rites; Aecom, United States; and the Korea Rail Network Authority.
In addition, four bidders have expressed an interest in the construction contract: Indian companies Larsen and Toubro and Tata; a joint venture of China’s Shanghai Tunnel Engineering and Singapore’s Who Hup Engineering; and Gulemark Agir, Turkey.
United States: The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) has awarded SNC-Lavalin a $US 20m five-year contract for the provision of corridor planning and development services. Under the contract, SNC-Lavalin will assist TxDOT to develop solutions to current and future transport needs on major rail corridors across the state.
Australia: The Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC) has appointed engineering firm WSP Australia to deliver the reference design and accompanying primary approvals documentation for the Albury - Illabo and Stockinbingal - Parkes sections of the Inland Rail project in New South Wales.
Work on the two sections with a combined length of 358km largely involves upgrading the current line to enable double stack freight trains to operate on the route. Specific work will include increasing vertical clearances around bridges and new passing loops.
Switzerland: The Swiss Transport Office (BAV) has approved the quadrupling of the southern 3.1km section of the Karlsruhe - Basle main line from the German/Swiss border via Basle Badischer station to the northern bank of the River Rhine in Basle. The line is owned by the German Federal Railroad Assets (BEV) special authority, and managed by infrastructure manager DB Networks. The SFr 260m ($US 289.1m) project will be completed in 2027.
Colombia: The China Harbour Engineering-Xi’an Metro consortium, which is leading construction of Bogota’s $US 4.3bn Line 1 metro project, has announced that it will begin open tendering for the provision of building materials and civil works in March 2021. The 24km line will be constructed in three stages and is currently scheduled for completion in 2025.
Russia: Russian Railways (RZD) is set to invest Roubles 4.5bn ($US 58m) in upgrades to locomotive facilities on the Trans-Baikal Railway in 2020. Work includes the construction of new maintenance sites at Zabaikalsk and Karymskaya stations and the reconstruction of the existing depot in Chita.
Germany: A local referendum on November 1 in the Hessen state capital of Wiesbaden rejected a €631m plan for a Wiesbaden Citybahn light rail project, which would have restored light rail to the city for the first time since 1955. 62% of voters rejected the proposal with a turnout of 46.2% (and a quorum set at 15%), following objections by the Free Democrat party, which argued that construction and operation of the light rail line could obstruct motorists.
Australia: Upgrades to the Eastern Goldfields Railway in Western Australia has been completed. The work was carried out by John Holland between early August and the end of October, and involved the replacement of 15km of dual-gauge line near Toodyay under a $A 6m contract awarded by infrastructure manager Arc Infrastructure.
Norway: An independent report carried out by the Norwegian Railway Directorate on behalf of the country’s Ministry of Transport and Communications has concluded that the cost of planned upgrades to the Østfold line, which includes track doubling between Haug, Råde, and Klavestad, Sarpsborg, has more than tripled from the estimated cost of NKr 12bn ($US 1.3bn) in 2012 to NKr 40bn in 2019. The upgrades are intended to enable the operation of regular inter-city services on the route.
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