Sydney’s light rail nightmare, which has seen services suspended for up to 18 months, appears to have gone global with another tram system abruptly shutting down for repairs this week.

Transport bosses in the British city of Birmingham have announced the suspension of all tram services “until further notice” after similar cracks to those found in Sydney were discovered on its carriages.

Sydney and Birmingham use the same Spanish made trams from manufacturer CAF. Similar vehicles also run on the Canberra and Newcastle tram systems.

It’s emerged that Birmingham and Sydney are two of four cities that have now had issues with the same tram fleets. That poses a problem for Sydney because it could mean there are not just its units to fix, but hundreds globally.

A public transport watcher said the CAF Urbos 3 trams used on the networks suffered from a “particularly poor design”....

...Compromises were made with the designs of the vehicle, Mr Galloway said, so the trams could be made with flat floors and so be fully accessible.

A lower floor meant the wheel sets, called bogies, were housed in boxes with a restricted space that didn’t leave room for them to swivel. In turn, that may have led to more stress on the wheels which was increased when the trams travelled around several tight corners on the L1 line.

That’s unlike Melbourne’s more modern – and more expensive – E-class trams based on a design from Canadian manufacturer Bombardier. Built in Melbourne, these trams have four sets of wheels per unit, not three as on the Urbos carriages, and they can swivel leading to less stress on the body.

Just weeks after services on a large chunk of Sydney’s light rail network were suspended due to cracks found on trams, Newcastle’s network – which uses the same Spanish built vehicles – has also been shut down.

Transport for NSW (TfNSW) has said all services on the Newcastle Light Rail network had been “temporarily suspended” until at least Monday.

Transport bosses said it was an unspecified “mechanical issue” but was unrelated to the cracking found on the wheel arches of the trams found in Sydney and other cities around the world including Birmingham.

“The fleet has been suspended temporarily as a precaution until inspections are completed.

“This issue is unrelated to the cracking issues identified in the inner west light rail fleet,” a TfNSW spokeswoman said.

“The six CAF Urbos 100 vehicles which are operated in Newcastle are the same baseline tram as those operated in the inner west L1 line, however these are newer and have some differing components and systems,” the spokeswoman said.

“Keolis Downer is working to urgently investigate and repair the fleet to restore passenger service as soon possible and at this stage the aim is to have some trams back in services by Monday,” the statement said....

The history of a train line is being celebrated on its 175th anniversary.

The Lancaster to Carlisle route opened on 15 December 1846 and formed a key part of the West Coast Mainline.

Photographic displays are being held at stations on the line organised by Cumbrian Railways Association, Avanti West Coast, Network Rail and the Cumbria Community Rail Partnership.

Historians said the 69-mile line was a notable achievement, being built in 30 months.

As well as photo displays at Penrith and Carlisle stations, commemorative plaques celebrating the anniversary are also being unveiled.

It’s the end of the line for many of the old subway cars that remain in New York City rail yards.

When New York City put R-32s into service in the mid-1960s, people called the shiny new train cars “Brightliners.” Over several decades, millions of people have traveled on R-32s, but the days when the iconic stainless steel cars were used to transport passengers are long gone.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which runs the New York City subway system, has removed all R-32s from the transportation network and replaced them with newly built R-179 train cars.

The R-32s are now being floated away to Jersey City, fated to be turned into scrap metal.

Several years ago, outdated NYC subway cars were placed in the Atlantic Ocean to create artificial reefs to protect the shoreline from flooding and provide habitat for sea life. But the stainless steel trains collapsed in the salt water, so scrapping the metal is now the preferred way to dispose of old subway cars....

Over 600 miles or 1,000 kilometers per hour: That’s how fast Canadian-French company TransPod promises the FluxJet will be, which is 2 to 3 times faster than the fastest trains in the world today. The FluxJet, a futuristic, all-electric take on ultra-high speed ground transportation, is a hybrid between a jet and train that would use a hyperloop system for its pod and would travel in a protected guideway. Hyperloop technology consists of a tube traveling inside a special pressurized system that allows it to zoom forward without much hindrance from air resistance. It taps into a new field of physics called “veillance flux” and was unveiled to the public in late July....

Three rare model locomotives have sold for thousands at auction.

The Fine Scale O Gauge models, made by James Stanley Beeson, went for £25,000 - nearly four times the total estimate.

A LNWR Ramsbottom 0-6-0T "Special Tank", listed for £1,500-£2,000, was auctioned for £14,000.

A 1958 locomotive "Belted Will" with tender, estimated at £2,000 to £3,000, sold for £9,500; while a 1940s LNWR 4-6-0 136 "Minerva" with tender, listed at £1,500 to £2,000, earned £3,400.

The sale was held on Wednesday by Market Harborough-based Gildings Auctioneers, which said it had bidders flying in from across Europe despite the auction being online-only.

A potential strike of tens of thousands of workers on America’s railroads is causing panic among everyone from online shoppers to grain operators who are hoping to avoid the supply chain headaches of the last two years. Amtrak said it was canceling all of its cross-country trains starting Thursday, Sept. 15, because many of its trains run on tracks maintained by the freight railroads.

But the question of whether workers decide to strike on Friday is overshadowing a bigger issue: the railroad industry is currently in turmoil, and even if a strike is averted, customers including farmers and energy producers say that the industry needs an overhaul.

Lockdowns followed by a surge of consumer demand created supply chain bottlenecks during the pandemic, making it harder for consumers to get hold of everything from tampons to garage doors. While trucking and shipping companies have begun to recover from these issues, the railroad industry has struggled more in 2022 than it did at the beginning of the pandemic. A survey of members of the American Chemistry Council, whose members ship everything from ethanol to sulfuric acid by rail, found that in July 2022, 46% of companies said rail delays and service challenges had gotten worse since the end of 2021, and only 7% said that service had improved. Nearly 60% of members surveyed said they had been charged higher rates....

Can they fix it or will there be more trucks on the road?

[url=America’s Railroads Are in Trouble–With or Without a Strike]America’s Railroads Are in Trouble–With or Without a Strike.[/url]

A potential strike of tens of thousands of workers on America’s railroads is causing panic among everyone from online shoppers to grain operators who are hoping to avoid the supply chain headaches of the last two years. Amtrak said it was canceling all of its cross-country trains starting Thursday, Sept. 15, because many of its trains run on tracks maintained by the freight railroads.

But the question of whether workers decide to strike on Friday is overshadowing a bigger issue: the railroad industry is currently in turmoil, and even if a strike is averted, customers including farmers and energy producers say that the industry needs an overhaul.

Lockdowns followed by a surge of consumer demand created supply chain bottlenecks during the pandemic, making it harder for consumers to get hold of everything from tampons to garage doors. While trucking and shipping companies have begun to recover from these issues, the railroad industry has struggled more in 2022 than it did at the beginning of the pandemic. A survey of members of the American Chemistry Council, whose members ship everything from ethanol to sulfuric acid by rail, found that in July 2022, 46% of companies said rail delays and service challenges had gotten worse since the end of 2021, and only 7% said that service had improved. Nearly 60% of members surveyed said they had been charged higher rates....

Cheers.

Reconstructing a T1 is the endeavor of The T1 Trust, a nonprofit that has, since 2013, been collecting the funds and expertise necessary to replace the institutional knowledge that died with the steam age. But even with its accumulated brainpower, original blueprints, and funding, progress is fated to be slow, as the T1 was as complicated a machine as it was immense.

Trains fitted with plasma jets and lasers are being trialled to clear leaves from railways more sustainably.

The technology is being tested on the East Lancashire Railway to see if it is as effective as high pressure water jets, Network Rail said.

The current fleet uses 200 million litres of water in autumn.

Network Rail said leaves could cause "serious problems" when compressed, making it harder for trains to brake or accelerate.

It said leaves were compressed by moving trains into a thin, black residue, which can also make it harder for signallers to detect a train's location.

The two companies involved in the testing are Laser Precision Solutions and PlasmaTrack.

While there are freight trains that are longer — with some measuring more than 3km — Saturday's event featured, by far, the longest passenger train ever run.
...
The Swiss train was comprised of 100 carriages measuring a total length of 1.9 kilometres.

... Louisiana State Police said crews were on-site Wednesday afternoon evaluating the derailment in St. James Parish, located about 50 miles west of New Orleans.

The derailment, in the community of Paulina, resulted in an acid leak, and residents in the immediate area have been evacuated, the St. James Parish government said.

The impacted railcar was holding approximately 20,000 gallons of hydrochloric acid, according to Louisiana State Police...