Deutsche Bahn intends to launch a tender for 30 high-speed trains with a top speed of 300 km/h which are expected to enter commercial operation in 2020. In addition, the company wants to launch another tender for conventional passenger trains to meet traffic demands. The high-speed trains will be deployed on Köln – Rhein/Main, Nürnberg – Ingolstadt and VDE 8 (Nürnberg – Berlin) rail routes.
“The passenger traffic will hugely increase, and we need to answer mobility demand. As roads will not be able to handle such an increase, railways are the answer to this problem. Railways will provide additional capacity and for this, we need additional trains. We will receive more new trains, but one problem that we face is that when the existing trains enter maintenance, the capacity decrease, as they are blocked in this process. In addition, when a new train is delivered, we lose time as they enter trials period that can last for over 1 year in some cases. Due to this problem, we intend to launch a tender for 30 tested high-speed trains, able to run at speeds of 300 km/h,” Berthold Huber, Member of DB Management Board, said. The announcement was made during the 6th Railway Forum Berlin, where Railway PRO is the Communication Partner.
Huber explained that this issue made DB to procure used trains. In this case, we remind you that this summer, DB and Westbahn, an Austrian rail operator, signed an agreement for the procurement of 17 Kiss double-deck EMUs, manufactured by Stadler. Most of the trains are only two years old and have achieved a high level of customer satisfaction. The first 9 trains will be delivered in December and will enter intercity services on the Dresden – Berlin – Oranienburg – Rostock route. Starting 2020, the trains will run every 2 hours on a daily basis. These EMUs will provide a capacity for 7,000 additional seats. The trains, consisting of 4 or 6 cars, will have 300 and 500 seats, depeding on the configuration. They are able to run at speeds of 200 km/h.
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