Railroad News

VIA Rail Canada Inc. has selected a joint venture formed by AECOM and Arup as the owner’s engineer (OE) to analyze a proposed high-frequency rail service in the Quebec City-Montreal-Ottawa-Toronto corridor.

The joint venture will support VIA Rail and the Canada Infrastructure Bank (CIB) in all technical and engineering matters during the pre-procurement phase of the project. Engineering and technical analysis is required for the project to receive final recommendation, VIA Rail officials said in a press release.

Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) yesterday awarded Archer Western Construction a $11.6 million contract to build a new light-rail station in Irving, Texas.

The future Hidden Ridge Station will be located between the existing North Lake College and Irving Convention Center stations on the Orange Line.

CN's road transportation subsidiary CNTL has selected ISAAC Instruments' telemetry solution to optimize the Class I's road safety efforts on its fleet of more than 1,000 trucks.

The devices are expected to be delivered and installed in the next 30 days, CN officials said in a press release.

U.S. railroads hauled 485,282 carloads and intermodal units during the week ending Jan. 25, a 6.7 percent decrease in traffic compared with the same week in 2019, according to Association of American Railroads (AAR) data.

Six of the 10 carload commodity groups that AAR tracks on a weekly basis posted increases. They included metallic ores and metals, up 1,064 carloads to 20,918; grain, up 288 carloads to 21,723; and miscellaneous carloads, up 234 carloads to 8,474.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) has scheduled $8.8 billion worth of construction projects from the 2010-2014 and 2015-2019 capital plans to begin this year and next, the New York City agency announced yesterday.

The MTA anticipates committing $6.5 billion worth of prior plan capital program work in 2020 and $2.3 billion in 2021, which will effectively exhaust all resources from the 2010-14 and 2015-19 plans. 

U.S. House Democratic leaders yesterday released the framework for a new $760 billion proposal to address the nation's growing infrastructure needs, including those related to rail.

Chairmen of the House committees on Transportation and Infrastructure (T&I), Energy and Commerce, and Ways and Means unveiled the plan, dubbed "Moving America and the Environment Forward," which they said would address the nation's massive infrastructure maintenance backlog and undertake projects that are "smarter, safer and made to last," according to a joint press release issued by the committees.

Alstom appointed Muslum Yakisan senior vice president in the Middle East and Africa; Benjamin Fitoussi, SVP of operations; and Thierry Best, chief commercial officer. Previously, Yakisan served as Siemens Mobility VP and the global head of commuter and regional trains and passenger coaches. Fitoussi most recently was chief operating officer and senior EVP for Nexans’ Europe and North America market. He also held numerous senior management roles at Alstom. Prior to his appointment, Best had been COO of Alstom since 2014, and has extensive experience in the rail industry, Alstom officials said in a press release.

Thales and Piper Networks completed a nine-month pilot of ultra-sideband (UWB) technology on MTA New York City Transit’s (NYCT) Flushing subway line. The pilot demonstrated the potential for UWB positioning technologies to integrate seamlessly with communications-based train control to improve system reliability and the speed of delivery for upgraded signaling systems, NYCT officials said in a press release.

The Regional Transportation District of Denver's (RTD) board yesterday appointed Paul Ballard interim general manager and chief executive officer. 

A start date for the position has yet to be announced.

Positive train control (PTC) was in operation on 98.5 percent of the required Class I route miles at the end of 2019, the Association of American Railroads (AAR) announced yesterday.

The nation's largest railroads remain on track to meet the federally mandated deadline of Dec. 31, 2020, for full PTC implementation, with several railroads already operating it across their entire required PTC footprint, AAR officials said in a press release.

MTA New York City Transit (NYCT) last week returned 298 Bombardier R179 rail cars to service after removing them from the subway fleet in response to two reports of door problems earlier this month.

LTK Engineering, NYCT and Bombardier Transportation completed inspections of and adjustments to all door systems. They also performed software upgrades and testing for the entire fleet.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao yesterday announced $5.4 million in grant selections as part of the Federal Transit Administration's Human Trafficking Awareness and Public Safety Initiative. 

Under the initiative, 24 organizations — including five transit-rail agencies — will each receive funding for projects to help prevent human trafficking and other crimes on public transportation. 

Norfolk Southern Corp. reported today fourth-quarter 2019 net income decreased 5 percent to $666 million, or $2.55 per diluted share, compared with net income of $702 million, or $2.57 per share, a year earlier.

The Class I's railway operating revenue declined 7 percent to $2.7 billion in the quarter, driven by a 9 percent decrease in total volume, NS officials said in a press release.

CN yesterday announced that fourth-quarter 2019 financial results were affected by an eight-day labor strike and "weak" freight demand, posting decreases in revenue, earnings per share and operating income.

Revenue during the quarter compared with the previous year's quarterly results declined 6 percent to CA$3.6 billion; diluted earnings per share (EPS) fell 22 percent to CA$1.22, adjusted diluted EPS dropped 16 percent to CA$1.25; and operating income and adjusted operating income each tumbled 16 percent to CA1.2 billion and CA$1.25 billion, respectively.

Onita Wayland, former president of the Grand International Auxiliary (GIA) to the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers (BLET), died Jan. 20. She was 91.

Her husband, Tony Wayland, a retired member of BLET Division 620 (Fort Worth, Texas), died the next day, Jan. 21. He was 97. The couple lived in Mart, Texas.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) yesterday unveiled a new campaign to combat hate crimes committed on its subway, commuter-rail and bus systems.

The frequency of hate crimes has been rising or remaining steady across the system, MTA officials said in a press release.