The Rail Engineer

In the shadow of central Europe’s highest mountain, The Mont Blanc Express line is a narrow-gauge single railway line winding its way just over 55km between Saint Gervais-les-Bains in the French Alps to the Swiss town of Martigny. Way back when the journey between Geneva and Chamonix took seven and a half hours by cart, [...]

The reason for building HS2 can sometimes be obscured in the fog of argument about whether people work on trains, benefit-cost ratios (BCR) and the like. Writes Tim Smart, Head of Engineering and Operations, HS2 Ltd There have been a number of negative comments in the media during the latter part of the summer concerning [...]

At nearly £15 billion, Crossrail is Europe’s largest current construction project. It will provide faster, more frequent main-line trains right into the heart of London, linking Heathrow directly with the City and Canary Wharf, connecting towns in the East and the West to central London, and delivering faster cross-city journeys between stations like Paddington, Liverpool [...]

The concept of Tram Train is a vehicle that operates as a tram on the tramway and a train on heavy rail, offering a seamless journey to the passenger into the heart of city centres and relieving capacity from mainline stations while taking the passengers where they want to go. The first Tram Train was [...]

Over 2,000 people have now registered to attend the first National Track Plant Exhibition held at the Rail Alliance site at Long Marston Business Park in Warwickshire on July 24-25. With more than 140 exhibitors, this free-to-attend event will allow visitors to see the latest innovations in track and plant. The rail engineer caught up [...]

Gauging has advanced rapidly in recent years from a process where vehicle gauges and structure gauges were simply profiles that must not be exceeded. Writes Dr David M Johnson, director, DGauge Ltd Most British rolling stock is now gauged ‘absolutely’; the swept envelope of the vehicle is modelled by computer and compared with a profile [...]

Over 135 exhibitors and more than 1,500 people have now registered to attend the two-day day, open air, live National Track Plant Exhibition taking place at Long Marston, Stratford-upon-Avon, July 24-25. The free-to-attend event is open to anyone who works in the rail industry and has been organised by Network Rail’s track delivery team, with [...]

Issue 100 of The Rail Engineer reported on the enabling works for Crossrail that were carried out at Christmas near Slough on the Great Western main line. On that occasion, principal contractor HOCHTIEF removed three brick arch bridges (two road bridges and one footbridge) and installed a new steel composite footbridge. At Easter the scores [...]

At Railtex this year, Westermo will be exhibiting a range of rail approved, Network Rail Certified, industrial data communications products such as the Ethernet Extenders, a great problem solver enabling businesses with legacy copper infrastructure to carry large amounts of Ethernet traffic. For newer infrastructure, where fibre networks are available, the Lynx Industrial Ethernet Switch [...]

In the run up to Railtex, Rail.co and the rail engineer will be looking at the must-see innovations on display at this year’s event. Harmill Systems Stand C111    Harmill Systems, the specialist depot plant and equipment engineers, will be exhibiting its new innovative road rail Train and Bogie Mover (TM300). A 4-wheel-drive vehicle with 4-wheel-steering [...]