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Events

By month

January events

  • January 16 – The Tozai Line in Kyoto is extended from Nijo to Uzumasa-Tenjingawa.

February events

  • February 27
  • – 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.

March events

  • March 9
  • &ndash; The Red line in Kaohsiung opens for service.
  • – Sprinter starts service between Oceanside and Escondido, California, 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 &ndash; Yokohama Municipal Subway's Green Line is opened for regular operations.
  • – Kolkata Metro is extended from Tollygunge station to Pranabnagar station.

April events

  • April 1 &ndash; 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.

260px|thumb|right|[[CRH3 unit for Beijing-Tianjin Intercity Railway]]

June events

  • June 2 &ndash; 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.
  • June 2–6 &ndash; AfricaRail 2008 Conference.
  • June 14 &ndash; Opening of the Tokyo Metro Fukutoshin Subway Line between Shibuya and Ikebukuro ().

July events

  • July 5 – Meeting between Venezuela, Colombia and Ecuador regarding a proposed rail link for freight and passengers between the three countries, also connecting the Pacific with the Atlantic.

August events

  • August 1
  • – China officially opens the Beijing–Tianjin intercity railway line, the first in the world regularly to host trains traveling up to .
  • – 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.

260px|thumb|right|[[LNER Peppercorn Class A1 60163 Tornado|Tornado, August 2008]]

September events

  • September 14 &ndash; The Orange line in Kaohsiung opens for service.

November events

  • November – Voter approval of Measure M in Los Angeles County, California, commits additional tax dollars to transit projects.

December events

  • December 14 – Final run of the original 0 series Shinkansen.
  • December 27
  • – The first section of the new Valley Metro Rail system, part of Valley Metro in Phoenix, Arizona, opened.
  • – The Monkey Park Monorail Line in Nagoya is abolished.

By season

Summer events

  • – The project to rebuild and upgrade Guiyang Southern Station to more than double its capacity is expected to be completed.

Unknown date events

  • – 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.
  • – The city of Saint Petersburg, Russia, will begin construction of a new intercity light railway beginning with a section between Baltiyskaya Zhemchuzhina and the Obukhovo metro station.

Accidents

  • 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.

Deaths

March deaths

  • March 16 – John Shedd Reed, president of Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway 1967-1986 (born 1917).

Industry awards

Japan

; Awards presented by the Japan Railfan Club

  • 2008 Blue Ribbon Award: JR Central & JR West N700 Series Shinkansen
  • 2008 Laurel Prize: JR East/Sendai Airport Transit E721 series/SAT721 EMU and JR East KiHa E200 DMU

References