 | This article needs to be updated.(March 2011) |
| Years in rail transport |
| Timeline of railway history |
This article lists events related to rail transport that occurred in 2008.
| This article needs to be updated.(March 2011) |
| Years in rail transport |
| Timeline of railway history |
This article lists events related to rail transport that occurred in 2008.
– Official opening of Santo Domingo Metro.
– National Express changes the name of the railway operating company one to National Express East Anglia as part of a company-wide rebranding exercise. [1] [2] 
March 9 – Sprinter starts service between Oceanside and Escondido, California, [3] reinstating passenger service on the Escondido branch line.
March 15 – The Osaka Higashi Line is scheduled to open in Osaka, Japan; the opening was originally scheduled for 2006, but delayed due to problems acquiring land. March 27 – Heathrow Terminal 5 station opens in London. March 30 – Yokohama Municipal Subway's Green Line is opened for regular operations.
– Kolkata Metro is extended from Tollygunge station to Pranabnagar station.[ citation needed ] April 1 – The Miki Railway Miki Line in Japan, which connected Yakujin Station in Kakogawa and Miki Station in Miki, is closed. April 26 – FrontRunner , a new commuter rail service, begins running in Utah. April 28 – Wrexham & Shropshire begin to run passenger services between London Marylebone station, the West Midlands, Shropshire and north-east Wales. [4] [5] [6] 
June 2 – An unexploded bomb from World War II is found near where the District and Hammersmith & City lines cross the Prescott Channel, not far from Bromley-by-Bow tube station, causing disruption to trains. [7] 
– China officially opens the Beijing–Tianjin intercity railway line, the first in the world regularly to host trains traveling up to 350 km/h (220 mph). [9] [10] [11] – LNER-design Peppercorn Class A1 60163 Tornado makes first official move under its own steam, the first main line steam locomotive built in Britain since 1960. [12] 
November – Voter approval of Measure M in Los Angeles County, California, commits additional tax dollars to transit projects. December 27 – The first section of the new Valley Metro Rail system, part of Valley Metro in Phoenix, Arizona, opened. [13] [14] [15] – The project to rebuild and upgrade Guiyang Southern Station to more than double its capacity is expected to be completed. [16]  | This section has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page . (Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
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– Indian Railways expects to complete the conversion of its electrified section in Mumbai from a 1,500 volt DC system to 25,000 volts AC; this will make the Mumbai section's electrification consistent with the rest of Indian Railways' network.
– Vietnam expects to complete construction on the Hanoi–Lào Cai railway line upgrade. [17] 
– The city of Saint Petersburg, Russia, will begin construction of a new intercity light railway beginning with a 26.5 km (16.5 mi) section between Baltiyskaya Zhemchuzhina and the Obukhovo [ ambiguous ] metro station. [18] April 28 – 2008 Shandong train collision: Sixty-six people are killed and almost 250 injured when a passenger train from Beijing careers off the rails and slams into another train in eastern China. The rail accident, the worst in China in more than a decade, happens near the city of Zibo in Shandong province.
August 8 – 2008 Studénka train wreck: A EuroCity train en route to Prague strikes a part of a motorway bridge that has fallen onto the track near Studénka station and derails, killing 8 people and injuring 64 others. September 12 – 2008 Chatsworth train collision: A Metrolink commuter train, having passed a signal at danger, collides head-on into a Union Pacific freight train in Los Angeles, killing 25 and injuring 130. [19] 
Commuter rail, or suburban rail, is a passenger rail transport service that primarily operates within a metropolitan area, connecting commuters to a central city from adjacent suburbs or commuter towns. Generally commuter rail systems are considered heavy rail, using electrified or diesel trains. Distance charges or zone pricing may be used.
Arriva Trains Wales was a British train operating company owned by Arriva UK Trains that operated the Wales & Borders franchise. It ran urban and inter-urban passenger services to all railway stations in Wales, including Cardiff Central, Cardiff Queen Street, Newport, Swansea, Wrexham General and Holyhead, as well as to certain stations in England such as Hereford, Shrewsbury, Chester, Crewe, Manchester Piccadilly and Birmingham New Street.
The Philippine National Railways (PNR) is a state-owned railway company in the Philippines which operates one commuter rail service between Metro Manila and Laguna, and local services between Sipocot, Naga and Legazpi in the Bicol Region. It is an attached agency of the Department of Transportation.
A Driving Van Trailer (DVT) is a British purpose-built control car railway vehicle that allows the driver to operate with a locomotive in push-pull formation from the opposite end of a train. A key benefit of operating trains with DVTs is the requirement for fewer locomotives; for example, a second locomotive would otherwise have to join at the other end of the train after arrival at terminal stations to lead the train's onward journey.
The East Rail line is one of ten lines of the Mass Transit Railway (MTR) system in Hong Kong. It used to be one of the three lines of the Kowloon–Canton Railway (KCR) network. It was known as the KCR British Section (九廣鐵路英段) from 1910 to 1996, and the KCR East Rail (九廣東鐵) from 1996 to 2007. East Rail was the only railway line of the Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation (KCRC) following the closure of the Sha Tau Kok Railway and before the construction of KCR West Rail.
The Cambrian Railways owned 230 miles (370 km) of track over a large area of mid Wales. The system was an amalgamation of a number of railways that were incorporated in 1864, 1865 and 1904. The Cambrian connected with two larger railways with connections to the northwest of England via the London and North Western Railway, and the Great Western Railway for connections between London and Wales. The Cambrian Railways amalgamated with the Great Western Railway on 1 January 1922 as a result of the Railways Act 1921. The name is continued today in the route known as the Cambrian Line.
The Class 67 locomotives are a class of Bo-Bo diesel-electric locomotives which were built for the English Welsh & Scottish Railway (EWS) between 1999 and 2000 by Alstom at Meinfesa in Valencia, Spain with drive components from General Motors' Electro-Motive Division.
The Shrewsbury–Chester line is a railway line between Chester and Shrewsbury in England, with the line passing through Wrexham County Borough in Wales. Passenger train services are operated by Transport for Wales Rail between the northern terminal of Chester and Shrewsbury in the south as part of the Wales & Borders franchise. Some additional services, starting part way along the line to London Euston via Chester are operated by Avanti West Coast. The line was built in 1846 by the Shrewsbury and Chester Railway, with the engineer for the line being Henry Robertson, a partner in locomotive builders Beyer Peacock, while the contractor was Thomas Brassey in partnership with William Mackenzie and Robert Stephenson. The line is part of Transport for Wales' North Wales Metro improvement programme.
Wrexham General railway station is a main line railway station and the main railway station serving Wrexham, north-east Wales. It is currently operated by Transport for Wales, but services are also provided by Avanti West Coast who operate a service to London Euston. Until January 2011 Wrexham & Shropshire also operated from here to London Marylebone.
Wrexham & Shropshire was an open access operator that provided passenger rail services in the United Kingdom. Services between Wrexham and London Marylebone operated from April 2008 until January 2011.
A control car, cab car, control trailer, or driving trailer is a non-powered rail vehicle from which a train can be operated. As dedicated vehicles or regular passenger cars, they have one or two driver compartments with all the controls and gauges required to remotely operate the locomotive, including exterior locomotive equipment such as horns, bells, ploughs, and lights. They also have communications and safety systems such as GSM-R or European Train Control System (ETCS). Control cars enable push-pull operation when located on the end of a train opposite its locomotive by allowing the train to reverse direction at a terminus without moving the locomotive or turning the train around.
The Sri Lanka Railway Department is Sri Lanka's railway owner and primary operator. As part of the Sri Lankan government, it is overseen by the Ministry of Transport. Founded in 1858 as the Ceylon Government Railway, it operates the nation's railways and links Colombo with other population centres and tourist destinations.
The Hitachi A-train is a family of rail rolling stock built and designed by Hitachi using a common base and construction techniques. The stock is designed to facilitate a number of product life-cycle improvements including ease of manufacture, increased energy efficiency, and recyclability.
Shanghai Hongqiao is one of the four major railway stations in Shanghai, China, the others being Shanghai railway station, Shanghai South railway station and Shanghai West railway station.
Futian station is a station on the Guangzhou–Shenzhen–Hong Kong Express Rail Link, and the final station on mainland China before the train enters Hong Kong. Futian is in the southern district of Shenzhen, where the central business district is located. The station opened on 28 June 2011 serving the Shenzhen Metro, and since 30 December 2015 it has been the first underground high speed railway station on a long-distance line in China. It serves as an interchange station between the Guangzhou–Shenzhen–Hong Kong Express Rail Link and Line 2, Line 3 and Line 11 of the Shenzhen Metro.
Rail transport is an important mode of long-distance transportation in China. As of 2021, the country had more than 150,000 km (93,206 mi) of railways, the second longest network in the world. By the end of 2021, China had more than 40,000 kilometres of high-speed rail (HSR), the longest HSR network in the world.
The British Rail Class 802 is a type of bi-mode multiple-unit passenger train built by Hitachi for Great Western Railway, TransPennine Express and Hull Trains.
