01/01/2014 (GulfNews - UAE): Shaikh Hamdan Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the Ruler’s Representative in the Western Region, inspected progress of UAE’s national railway network, developed by Etihad Rail, in Al Mirfa in the Western Region on Tuesday.
He checked the work on the first phase of the railway network and ongoing preparations to operate the first cargo train in UAE’s history...
01/01/2014 (Haaretz - Israel): Dozens of scientists from various Israeli academic institutions who are actively involved in environmental protection turned this week to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with the request that he seriously reconsider the projected construction of a rail line that would connect Tel Aviv with Israel’s southernmost port, Eilat, on the shores of the Red Sea. The scientists are deeply concerned over what...
01/01/2013 (Hurriyet - Turkey): Turkey
opened the world’s first underwater rail link between two continents, Marmaray, on Oct. 29, connecting Asia and Europe with the $2.8 billion tunnel that was inaugurated with a fanfare
ceremony.
- A Turkish consortium on May 3 won a $29 billion tender—the largest in
Turkey’s history— to build and operate a third airport in Istanbul, which is slated to be one of the world’s largest, marking a milestone in the country’s ambition to become a global transit
hub...
01/01/2014 (News Track India - India): New Delhi, Jan.1 (ANI): Railway Board Chairman Arunendra Kumar has called upon all railwaymen to focus on providing railway customers a pleasant experience in both passenger and freight segments.
In a New Year greeting message sent to all fellow railway colleagues, Kumar pointed out that service with a smile was never so relevant as it is today.
Kumar also said that there is a need to earnestly endeavour to meet the Railways motto of "No loss of life" in train operations...
01/01/2014 (WantChinaTimes - China).A high-speed railway linking Beijing with Shenyang, the capital of northeast China's Liaoning province, is expected to kick off construction in the first half of 2014.
The 709-km railway will cut travel time between the two cities in half to 2.5 hours, said Tian Limin, a senior manager of the railway project at a conference organized by the Liaoning provincial government on Monday...
04/01/2014 (Emirates 24/7 - UAE): In his first book My Vision, His Highness Sheikh
Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE, and Ruler of Dubai, reminisces the day that he stood next to his father, staring at what was to become Jebel Ali
port, a project masterminded by the late Sheikh Rashid.
“This project, which was realised within two years, was way ahead of its time when it was inaugurated in 1979. It
was an undertaking of epic proportions for a small emirate such as Dubai and I doubt any consultant engineer would have wanted to undertake its feasibility study back then,” he writes....
04/01/2014 (Hurriyet Daily News - Turkey): The Justice and Development Party (AKP) era is remembered and will be remembered with construction. Rapid rises in construction investments were a reality, both in the public
and the private sector. Whether the construction processes that particularly “boomed” in Istanbul were in accordance with development plan laws or urbanization codes, whether the urban profits
were channeled to particular capital groups that have been a significant leg in the corruption investigations launched at the end of 2013.
Boom in
construction
After 2002, as a result of both the favorable domestic and international
climates, the influx of external resources increased, and each year there was a flow of external resources exceeding an average of 40 billion dollars. This, as a result, facilitated a growth
performance nearing 5 percent annually...
09/01/2014 (World Bulletin - Turkey):The Director General of Expansion Projects at Saudi Railways Organization, Wasmi Al-Ferraj, has declared a date for the planned completion of a high-speed train line between the holy cities Mecca and Medina.
Having passed the halfway mark, the Haramain link is expected to be completed by December 2015, he said.
The train line will also host stations at the city of Jeddah and Jeddah International Airport, which is commonly used by Muslims from all over the world who come to the region to perform Hajj and Umrah pilgrimages...
09/01/2014 (Gulf News - UAE): Gulf countries are studying a $10bn plan to extend the length of a 2,177-km (1,353-mile) rail line between Kuwait and Oman by 60% in order to link it to Yemen in the south of the Arabian peninsula.
The six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council has begun a feasibility assessment of the additional 1,373-km section, which would feature 12 stations and terminate at the Yemeni border, Nada Abu al-Samh, a financial analyst at the GCC General Secretariat, said at a rail symposium in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Gulf states are examining the plan as work progresses on the $15.5bn core rail route from the borders of Iraq to Muscat on the India Ocean. Some 120km of track have been laid in the UAE and about 200km in Saudi Arabia, Ramiz al-Assar, a transport specialist at the World Bank and adviser to the project, said at the conference, calling on nations to expedite formation of a single management body.
“The rest of the GCC countries have all started the design phases so it is crucial to form the GCC Railway Authority as soon as possible to oversee the progress of the project,” al-Assar said...
09/01/2014 (AzerNews - Azerbaijan): The project of Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway was discussed in a working meeting by the involved parties at Georgian Economy Ministry on January 8th.The meeting - presided over by Georgia's Deputy Prime Minister- was mainly focused on adopting measures to be implemented in 20-14 to accomplish the project.Georgia's First Deputy Economy Minister Dmitry Kumsishvili, Deputy Minister Natia Mikeladze, Director of Marabda-Kartsakhi Railway LLC Oleg Bichiashvili, and other high-ranking officials attended the meeting...
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