The bidding line-up also includes Cowi & Partners, Hamdan Consulting, Scott Wilson Railway, WS Atkins, Mott MacDonald, Reinhardt Consultancy, Modern Engineering, Merrit International, Dornier Consulting, Italfeer, Khatib & Alami, Systra, Bovis, Sunjin, DB International, Parsons Brinkerhoff, LG International, RATES and Dar al Handasah.

The Supreme Committee for Town Planning is overseeing the conception and design of the Batinah Railway project on behalf of the Ministry of National Economy. Envisaged is an arterial railway that will run within the same corridor through which the proposed Batinah Expressway is planned. The roughly 260-km long corridor, running parallel to the existing Batinah Highway, starts from Halban Road near Naseem roundabout and travels north all the way to Khatmat Malaha on the border with the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

According to officials, the railway project will help alleviate traffic flows along the existing Batinah Highway, which is presently the only major traffic corridor serving the wilayats of the Batinah region. The highway also serves as the main overland link between Oman and the UAE and other GCC states. A rail route, officials point out, will also minimise disruptions to traffic caused by major accidents or overflowing wadis that crisscross the highway.

The selected consultant will spell out the design requirements of the Batinah Railway project, based upon which a full-fledged feasibility and detailed design will be carried out in the next phase. In studying the design requirements of the project, the selected consultant will take into account the following key elements: traffic forecasts, railway standard, design speed, conceptual operation schedule, alignment, single or double tracks, branch lines, terminals and stations, marshalling yard and maintenance facilities, electrification, and signalling and telecom systems, among other technical and environmental aspects.

Importantly, the consultant will determine if the Batinah railway will embrace the standards of the International Union of Railways (UIC), the worldwide organisation for international co-operation among railways and promotion of rail transport at a global level. Additionally, the need to harmonise the standards of the Batinah railway with the proposed GCC railway network will be explored as well.

Besides, the consultant will spell out the respective design speeds for passenger and freight trains taking into account the terrain, level of services, construction costs, and harmonisation with the GCC railway network. A key aspect of the consultant's brief is to outline the kind of rail services to be offered to passenger and freight customers, depending upon the traffic forecasts. In Turkey, where Fortis is listed as a 94 per cent-owned subsidiary worth 1.071 billion lira ($868.1 million), the group sought to reassure investors that its position remained strong.

"Fortis Turkey is still continuing its commercial activities successfully and it is growing in a stable fashion," the financial group said in a statement. Weekends have become a tense time for financial institutions and investors because they have been marked recently by around-the-clock negotiations to save some prominent US financial institutions.

Two weeks ago, US investment bank Lehman BrothersLehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy protection and Merrill LynchMerrill Lynch agreed to be taken over by Bank of America over a long and tense weekend. Since then, US insurer American International Group was rescued by US authorities, and Washington Mutual was closed by the government and sold to JP Morgan Chase & Co.

This week, US legislators will try to reach an agreement on a proposed $700 billion bailout for Wall Street and questions are swirling about whether Belgian and Dutch financial and banking authorities will devise a plan to support Fortis. A bailout deal in Washington could restore confidence in the European financial sector and together with a new CEO and a more open communication policy, Fortis could be saved, a senior Fortis insider said. Verwilst told a conference call on Friday there was no way that Fortis would go bankrupt.

The biggest vulnerability for Fortis right now would be depositors withdrawing funds and forcing the bank to shore up more capital than it is capable of. Fortis shares, which closed down 20 per cent at 5.2 euros on Friday, has lost more than two-thirds of its value since buying the Dutch operations and asset management arm of ABN AMRO as part of a three-bank, 70 billion euros buyout consortium.

By Conrad Prabhu

© Oman Daily Observer 2008

 

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