2000 in rail transport

Events

January events

* January 4 - The Åsta accident, a northbound BM92 multiple unit and a southbound passenger train headed by a Di 3 locomotive collided on Norway's Rørosbanen line near Åsta station, killing 19 people.
* January 28 - Amtrak begins to operate an electric service throughout between New York and Boston. [cite book|author=Cudahy, Brian J.|title=A Century of Subways|date=2003|publisher=Fordham University Press|location=New York|isbn=0-8232-2292-6]
* January 29 - The Termini Station, in Rome, opens.

February events

* February 4 - German railway saboteur Klaus-Peter Sabotta is sentenced to life imprisonment for attempted murder and extortion.

May events

* May 23 - General Motors Electro-Motive Division delivers to the Union Pacific Railroad the first five EMD SD70M diesel locomotives in the largest single order (1,000 locomotives) for diesel locomotives ever by a single railroad. [cite web|author=General Motors Electro-Motive Division|date=May 23 2000|url=http://www.emdiesels.com/en/company/news/links/20000523_UP_sd70m.html|title=General Motors' Electro Motive ships first five locomotives for huge Union Pacific order|accessdate=2005-04-13]

June events

* June 7 - The Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel, originally built for rail traffic in 1943, opens for combined rail/highway traffic, making it the longest combined rail/highway tunnel in North America.

July events

* July 1 – Opening of the Oresund Bridge bridge-tunnel carrying road traffic and the Oresund Railway between Denmark and Sweden. [cite web|url= http://osb.oeresundsbron.dk/frontpage/?lang=1|title=Øresund Bridge|accessdate=2007-08-01]
* July 4 - Amtrak's new Bakersfield Station opens.
* July 11 - VIA Rail Canada announces that it will use five sleeping cars leased from Amtrak for runs between Winnipeg and Churchill, Manitoba.
* July 14 - The United States Surface Transportation Board's temporary moratorium on railroad mergers is upheld by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit; the ruling contributes to the failure of the proposed BNSF/CN merger.
* July 21 - Manchester Metrolink, in Manchester, England, is extended to Eccles.

October events

* October 2 - VIA Rail operates a funeral train for Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau between Ottawa and Montreal; the train's journey, which was frequently slowed through towns for the numerous well-wishers, was documented by a CBC news helicopter. [cite web|work=Colin Churcher's Railway Pages|date=September 7 2005|url=http://www.railways.incanada.net/candate/ottawa.htm|title=Significant dates in Ottawa railway history|accessdate=2005-09-30]

* October 17 - The Hatfield rail crash, south of Hatfield, Hertfordshire, UK, occurs when a train traveling at 115 mph derails due to a rail that breaks under it. 4 people are killed, and there is considerable disruption to the national rail network as the infrastructure is reviewed. [cite news|last=Left|first=Sarah|title=Key dates in Britain's railway history|work=The Guardian Unlimited|date=2002-01-15|url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/transport/Story/0,2763,633951,00.html]
* October 29 - Amtrak upgrades service on the "California Zephyr" to daily.

November events

* November 11 - An faulty heater aboard a funicular train in Kaprun, Austria, starts a fire in the train's brake fluid while the train is in a tunnel; only four of the train's 155 passengers survived the fire in the Kaprun disaster.

Unknown date events

* Robert Krebs resigns as Chief Executive Officer of Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway
* The fourth and final phase of Cairo Metro's Line Two (Yellow) opens.
* Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway and Canadian National Railway file for a merger, but the merger is denied by regulatory agencies.
* The Iwateichinohe Tunnel on the Morioka-Hachinohe section of Japan's Tōhoku Shinkansen is completed; at 25.8 km (16 miles) long, it is the longest land rail tunnel to date.

Deaths

Awards

North America

;2000 E. H. Harriman Awards

;Awards presented by Railway Age magazine
* 2000 Railroader of the Year: "The railroad worker" (the award for 2000 was changed to "Railroader of the Century")
* 2000 Regional Railroad of the Year: Bessemer and Lake Erie Railroad
* 2000 Short Line Railroad of the Year: Arkansas Midland Railroad

United Kingdom

;Train Operator of the Year
* 2000:

References

* Some of the events listed here were translated from [http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000_dans_les_chemins_de_fer 2000 dans les chemins de fer] , the equivalent French-language Wikipedia article.
* Green, Timothy C. (September 1 2004), " [http://www.trainscan.com/news/scan/s0008/ Train Scan August 2000] ". Retrieved July 7 2005.