Subscribe to RSS4 Bids To Build Trains
KiwiRail has drawn up a short list of four potential suppliers to build Auckland’s 38 new electric multiple units.
Hyundai Rotem, the South Korean company which is building Wellington’s new electric Matangi trains, now being shipped (left) is among the bidders.
There were no New Zealand bids made.
The bids have come from rolling stock manufacturers:
- Hitachi Limited
- Hyundai Rotem
- Bombardier Transportation Australia Pty Limited
- a consortium of Construcciones y Auxiliar de Ferrocarriles, SA. (CAF) and Mitsubishi Corporation,
KiwiRail says this means the process is on track to award the tender by the middle of next year and have the first trains on the ground and operational from 2013.
Wellington's new trains on way to be shipped from Korea
So what happens now?
The four firms will now have the opportunity to provide feedback into the technical requirements and specifications for the rolling stock.
A full set of RFP (Request for Proposal) documents are released to them in August,.
They will then have until November to submit their final bids.
The decision on the successful bidder will be made late in the first quarter or early in the second quarter of next year.
Trains arrive 2013.
A few years before it's time for the old ones to move on
KiwiRail confirmed it is working closely with the Auckland Regional Transport Authority on the procurement process.
ARTA Chief Executive, Fergus Gammie said he was pleased with the good progress made to date on the project and the robustness of the shortlist of suppliers.
KiwiRail CEO Jim Quinn confirmed that there were no New Zealand-led bids.
“However all bidders are aware of the capacity for local content here in New Zealand and the full extent to which this is included will be understood in the next step of the process.”
Transport minister Steven Joyce says KiwiRail has told him that they are very happy with the number and quality of bids.
18 Comments
Does ARTA have a say at all in all this?
@James (Updated) yes it will work with ARTA thru the procurement process
“In a year- at the end of July 2010″
Don’t you mean July 2011?
@newnewt Thanks- no I got it wrong. i forgot what year we are in!! Have corrected-end of this month
they seem like pretty capable bidders. Looking forward to the result. Hope that cost doesn’t become the deciding factor though.
Interestingly Mitsubishi are going with CAF and not Hyundai-Rotem for Auckland. I hope that Stephen Joyce and co. don`t push Kiwirail to give it to to Hyundai Rotem using virtually the same design as Wellington just to save costs through a “bulk order deal” without understanding that the specifications for Auckland are quite different. If given to Hyundai Rotem I hope the design will be a specialized one for Auckland`s needs.
It’s ironic seeing a train on the back of a truck
Didn’t Hyundai make the new high speed trains to run in Kent, England on High Speed Line 1 as it’s now called I think….?
Bombaider have made a nice 3 set train here for the Perth Metro, although im probably guessing the gauge here is a lot wider? easy roll in roll out access for Wheel chair users, fold up and down seats at the entrances for people with bikes ect.
interesting times a head, but serially, I hope the don’t fuck around for another whole year decided, just get it over and done with and lets get them on the rails. also please for the love of GOD do not get the same stupid colour scheme as the wellington trains!
they should run a competition for the color scheme.
also I’d like to ask, since so few of Auckland train stations have toilets, are any of these trains going to have one on them? I know South West trains in London have a wheel chair access toilet on some of there routes that are just as long as Pukekohe to Auckland.
that carriage is then deemed as a wheelchair, bike carrying standing carriage….. anyone else find that annoying? considering 1/2 the stations on the Metro network are just “tin sheds”.
I’m not too bothered by the colour scheme, (except for the acid coloured poles on the interior.
As long as it is nice, new and fresh.
I reckon we should stop complaining about the colours and look at how Tranz Metro will (hopefully!!) improve
@Carl, pretty sure the gauge in Perth is the same as Auckland although i could be wrong. They are both narrow gauge as is Brisbane I think. Also no the trains are not going to have toilets to the best of my knowledge.
Carl - Perth and Brisbane use the same gauge as Auckland, the DMU’s we have now are all ex Perth. I imagine that the Bombaider offer is using largely the same design
well if that is the case, IMO i use them 4-5 times a day with TAFE and work. Sleek, spacious and excellent Air Con during the high 30′s and 40′s in the summer. They are pretty quite too. From memory I recall top speed being around the 120/130km p/h mark.
other than that i know nothing about trains as such, but I have traveled a lot and was really surprised at how good these ones are, from a customer point of view I guess.
I hope that auckland also adopts the ticketing service we have here.
so easy, tag off the bus, tag on to the train, and then tag off when your done, fast, easy to use and no hassles really.
Anthony - I actually think the colour scheme is quite important, it helps in the whole atmosphere experience of Public transport, if it looks cheap it will feel cheap, we need to give a good overall experience to get people out of their cars and into trains, and that colour scheme look absolutely horrible. Every aspect plays a part, like having free wifi would help.
I hope Auckland don’t use the same as the new Wellington trains, whats wrong with the current interior colour scheme?
I hope that KiwiRail go with the Spanish crowd. I met some members of the Spainish trade delegation last year and was impressed with their committment to NZ. I did a little research - the Spanish govt is building high speed lines left, right, and centre - and the companies involved are vertical operators, building the carriages, lines and associated infrastructure. This tells me that they have depth of knowledge about trains.
Is four bidders a high number for such a contract? I guess if they all proceed to final bids then it will allow a reasonable level of choice, but somehow it doesn’t sound high to me.
As for the colour scheme, that is several years off, and can / is going to change several times during the train’s lifetime, so not really that important now. I have kinda gotten to like the yellow-blue scheme we have, but really, not a biggie.
I expect that toilets would cost you several seats per car. Sure, you could have only one toilet in every three car-set, but in the end, this is a commuter type operation, so it would be better to provide more toilets at stations, I think.
There will not be any toilets in the EMUs according to the specification, and you don’t really need them for suburban runs that are under an hour in length.
Howver, if they are no longer using the Silver Ferns on the Pukekohe run they should look at outfitting a few of the carriage trains with toilets to suit.
For Simon,
Mitsui who Hyundai Rotem teamed up with for Wellington & Mitsubishi are two different companies.
Both are well known Japanese Investmant and Trading Companies