Spain awards $2.29 billion in train contracts

Railway Age, April, 2004

The Spanish state railway RENFE has awarded contracts valued at 1.83 billion euros ($2.29 billion) for 85 new trains. Of these, 75 will be 156-mph trains. Under a contract worth 930 million euros, a consortium of Alstom (France) and CAF (Spain) will supply and maintain 30 wide-gauge trains and 45 variable-gauge trains. A 370 million euro order placed with Bombardier (Canada) and Talgo (Spain) is for 26 variable-gauge trains. (Most track in Spain is wide gauge; variable gauge means they can be used in international service.) RENFE also awarded a contract worth 143 million euros to Talgo for sleeper cars. All of the contracts include maintenance for 14 years.

In addition to conventional trains like these, Spain continues to expand its high speed (186 mph) network, which is being built to standard gauge. A Madrid-Seville high speed line has been hugely successful, and a Madrid-Barcelona line is close to completion.

RENFE placed another order with Siemens for 10 class S103 Valero E high speed trains, under a contract valued at 240 million euros ($294.8 million). Siemens will maintain these trains for 14 years under a 190 million euros ($233.4 million) contract.

Siemens is already supplying 14 class S103 trains to RENFE. The S103 is based on ICE3, but has a maximum speed of 218 mph, compared with only 186 mph for ICE3.

The Spanish Transport Ministry announced in February' that it would increase rail spending by 25% this year to $6.36 billion euros (around $8 billion).

International Railway Journal, Railway Age's sister magazine based in the U.K. reported that rail spending in Spain now accounts for almost half of spending for all transportation modes. Highways, for example, are to get 2.27 billion euros; airports, 2.3 billion; and ports, 927 million. According to IRJ Editor David Briginshaw, this "will put Spain into first place in Europe for railway investment [and] second place in world terms behind China (at about $8.5 billion) and just ahead of the United States (at about $7.5 billion)."