Union Railway appoints consultant for AED 30 billion project
Tuesday, 03 Nov 2009
Khaleej Times reported that the Union Railway has appointed a consultant to develop the AED 30 billion railway project’s strategy, implementation plan as well as its operating and business model.
Following the decree to form Union Railway’s board of directors earlier this month by the President His Highness Shaikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the ground breaking project to build the UAE’s railway network gathered pace at the Board of Director’s first official meeting chaired by Mr Hussain Al Nowais chairman of Union Railway.
The board was briefed on the progress made to date by the Abu Dhabi Passenger and Freight Railway Committee since its inception 2 years ago. Initial steps were also agreed at the meeting to drive the project forward into its next stage of growth.
The UAE would be the second nation after Saudi Arabia to have a railway network, with plans to interconnect with the GCC network in future.
The 1,100 kilometers railway will be built to link the principal centers of population and industry of the UAE and form a part of the planned GCC railway network. The AED 30 billion railway which will be built to international standards of interoperability will run at speeds of between 80 kilometers and 120 kilometers per hour for freight transport and between 160 kilometers and 200 kilometers per hour for passenger transport.
The board discussed the development of the most effective and suitable operations, procurement and financial models for Union Railway. The members also focused on the organization’s recruitment strategy and emphasized their intent to build a world class team made up of the most qualified, professional talent.
Most recently, industry expert Mr Richard Bowker who formerly led the UK’s National Express and Strategic Rail Authority was appointed as CEO of Union Railway. Talking on the meeting, Mr Al Nowais termed the meeting as an important milestone to create this historic railway. Today, our highest priority is building a best in class logistics and passenger network with the highest caliber team to run the business successfully.
Mr Al Nowais said that in line with the government’s Emiratisation initiative, Union Railway is actively developing the UAE National workforce. He said that we are in talks with several local and international educational institutions to develop specialized transport engineer curriculums in an effort to develop local talent to run Union Railway in the future.
