By 2024-03-26T13:22:00+00:00 PORTUGAL: Agreement has been reached to restore passenger services on an orbital line in the northern suburbs of Porto The first trains are expected to begin running this year A protocol to restore passenger services was signed at São Mamede de Infesta station on March 21 by representatives from Matosinhos municipality national road and rail infrastructure manager Infraestruturas de Portugal services would be restored on the section running north and west from the existing station at Contumil as far as Leça do Balio Hospital São João and São Mamede de Infesta The three signatories have each committed to contributing €1m towards the capital investment required and will provide accessible platforms at Contumil and São Gemil Matosinhos municipality will be responsible for rebuilding and accessibility works at São Mamede de Infesta and Leça do Balio as well as further accessibility projects at the new stations to be built by IP Studies are also to be undertaken for a second phase which would extend the passenger services westwards along the whole of the 19 km line to the port of Leixões; this was envisaged in the PNI2030 National Investment Programme Two trains/h in each direction would link Campanhã and Leça do Balio with some services running through to other parts of the Porto suburban network Rail services are expected to be integrated with Metro do Porto and wider public transport in the UNIR Porto metropolitan area The Contumil – Leixões line was built in 1938 and carried passenger services until 1966 The then freight-only line was electrified in 1998 and passenger services were reinstated in 2009 they were suspended again in 2011 as ridership was below expectations the trains operated over an 11 km route from Leça do Balio to Ermesinde in the northeast and there were fewer stations serving the densely populated areas.  PORTUGAL: Metro do Porto has awarded CRRC Tangshan a contract to supply trams equipped for GoA2 attended automatic operation on the future Line H (Ruby) PORTUGAL: Suburban services in the Matosinhos district of Porto has been enhanced with the partial reopening of the Leixões line to passengers after a hiatus of 14 years PORTUGAL: The national rail discount pass launched by the government on October 21 has seen strong uptake in the first month Site powered by Webvision Cloud This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks The action you just performed triggered the security solution There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase You can email the site owner to let them know you were blocked Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page Bruno Fernandes has excelled at Manchester United and is expected to be a similarly creative force for Portugal at the World Cup – a far cry from his days as a bit of a journeyman and even a defender in his youth That sometimes haphazard journey began in the suburbs of Porto where Fernandes played between the rows of low-rise council houses and in the playground of his primary school "That toughened him up because he was playing with his big brother or with us He had character," recalls Lucio Fernandes Fernandes was given a trial by the local team in the town of Sao Mamede de Infesta whose outdated facilities are wedged between rows of houses and a motorway interchange 'This kid has to stay.' You could see he had talent and that we needed to make the most of it," says Sergio Marques His parents couldn't drive so FC Infesta had to find a way to get the youngster to training – at age eight little Bruno was so talented that the coach decided to offer him a one-on-one session each week "Despite his age he was a hard worker and full of determination He had an incredible capacity for learning Whatever I taught him during the week he would go out and show it in matches at the weekend," says Marques Alegria e muito trabalho já no ???? a preparar o primeiro jogo ???? pic.twitter.com/LudQWmyf0P At the time the club played on a dirt pitch which has since been replaced by an immaculate synthetic surface "I used to play him as a central defender because he was always one step ahead of the attackers but when the game was easy I let him play in midfield," says Marques who still calls Fernandes by his other family name Fernandes became a target for the two leading clubs in the region His family opted for the more modest Boavista who laid on a minibus to take him to training But first he was loaned out to another local side where coach Antonio Ribeiro arrived when Fernandes was 15 "When I came to the club Bruno's team wasn't winning any games He was playing as a central defender and I decided to make him the playmaker It was from that moment on that we started to win games "He was scrawny but wasn't afraid to get stuck in And off the pitch he was a really humble teenager "But on the pitch he had a strong personality and so was often squabbling." Fernandes was 17 when he returned to Boavista and was moved up an age group on the request of then-coach Joaquim 'Martelinho' Silva a former winger for the club when they won the Portuguese title in 2001 He was the type of player who deserved special attention because he was the best player for his team," says Silva In the 2011/12 season Fernandes appeared to be on the verge of breaking into the first team but a corruption affair that shook Portuguese football left Boavista in the third division "His dream was to break into the first team and into the first division," says Silva he must have felt he couldn't fulfil that aim and so needed to leave." joining Serie B Novara for 40 000 euros For a spell he was a bit of a journeyman as spells at Udinese and Sampdoria followed before he returned to Portugal and this time became a star at Sporting Lisbon A 63-million-euro move to Old Trafford followed in January 2020 and the attacking midfielder "He deserves all the credit because he was alone when he went to Italy without speaking the language," adds Silva but his ambition was such that he grew into the player he is now."