Via Rail's Fleet Renewal Program

The Justin Trudeau Government in the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa, ON will give a
part of budget 2018 of the Canada's Finance Minister Bill Morneau to Via Rail Canada for replace his fleet yesterday.

VIA Rail is excited to announce that following the Federal Budget 2018 it will acquire a new train fleet to replace the current rolling stock operating within the Quebec City – Windsor corridor, which serves the majority of our passengers. It is expected that by 2022, we will be welcoming Canadians onboard a brand new set of trains.

http://www.viarail.ca/en/about-via-rail/fleet-renewal" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Seems VIA wants to use the Seimens "brightline" concept and consists,BBD's LRC attempt was a bit of a failure.
However figure on some political pressure to give BBD the contract.

I don't know about the political pressure - Bombardier hasn't been chosen in Quebec for the last 2 projects and I suspect that the Bombardier name (at least in rail) has such a bad reputation with the general public that it would be a brave politician that forced a Bombardier choice.

It's also worth noting (perhaps as a warning to the politicians) that Bombardier also betrayed a politician. My recollection is the then mayor of Toronto (David Miller) did everything to give Bombardier the streetcar contract in a large part for supporting Canadian workers. Of course Bombardier then outsourced much of the work to Mexico.

We will have to see what gets posted on Merx but the last invitation to discuss centred on integrated trainsets - the only condition Siemens couldn’t satisfy is dual mode but there is hardly a strand of 25kV between Quebec and Windsor. We don’t know how this strategy fits with REM. I honestly don’t think we know a lot more than we did yesterday.

Hope they don't get too caught up on that 'electrification-capable' spec. Non-electric locos are dirt cheap, comparatively to replace, than the cost of electrification. And even then, realistically, would electrification ever make sense?

Why wouldn't it be reasonable? Faster trains, modern equipment, lower maintenance costs, integration with Toronto's electrification plans, not terribly expensive hydro?

mdvle wrote:My recollection is the then mayor of Toronto (David Miller) did everything to give Bombardier the streetcar contract in a large part for supporting Canadian workers. Of course Bombardier then outsourced much of the work to Mexico.

In fact the car shells and much of the equipment were sourced from Mexico. Only some final assembly and delivery work is actually done in Thunder Bay. And in the case of the CTA 5000s, the first stainless cars built from the ground up in Plattsburgh since that assembly plant added stainless welding and fabrication capability, the subframes are from Mexico. The BART cars in Plattsburgh have their car shells Mexican built as well.

Simple answer regarding REM is that the 2 don't mix.

The combination of REM train frequency and 2 stations inside the tunnel mean VIA diesel trains are not going to work.

As for electric capability, 30 years is a long time and while nothing is guaranteed I wouldn't be surprised if the corridor isn't electric before the end of that 30 year lifetime of the equipment. The Toronto - Windsor portion will likely be done (though the recent turmoil in the provincial PC party could change things), but that also may mean VIA losing south-western Ontario service.

Not much additional info but the official announcement that the new equipment will be ordered happened today.

The new trains will have wheelchair lifts built in:

https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/v ... 67403.html

Minister of Transport Marc Garneau on Monday announced that Ottawa will provide funding for VIA Rail to replace its fleet in the Quebec City-Windsor Corridor, which accounts for 94% of the operator’s ridership, with 32 new, bi-directional trains. Does anybody know who will be building the trains for them?

Ira wrote:Minister of Transport Marc Garneau on Monday announced that Ottawa will provide funding for VIA Rail to replace its fleet in the Quebec City-Windsor Corridor, which accounts for 94% of the operator’s ridership, with 32 new, bi-directional trains. Does anybody know who will be building the trains for them?

Chances are good it’ll be Siemens at Sacramento, CA, final assembly somewhere in Canada. Outside possibility it’ll be Bombardier, Alstom, or China Railroad Corporation.

Moderator Note: moved to Canadian Passenger and flagged for merger into existing topic.

A; How many rail cars would they need to make up 32 trains?
B; How many cars do the existing corridor trains on average?
C; Then multiply by 32 would get us a good estimation of number of new cars needed.

Does anyone have the answer to question B ?

electricron wrote:B; How many cars do the existing corridor trains on average?
Does anyone have the answer to question B ?

It varies depending on which train and day of the week. The shortest train (Toronto-Sarnia) is usually only two cards while some Montreal-Toronto trains are as long as seven or eight. The more typical consist is one business class car and two, three or four economy class cars. I would say the average per train is four.

How this works out to 32 trains is anyone's guess since there's a chance they will all be a fixed length and more cars would be needed total.

Stadler makes trains that would fit VIA's requirements well - check out these trains for the East Anglia franchise in UK.
British Rail Class 755.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_755" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
As part of this an order was placed with Stadler Rail for 38 Bi-Mode Multiple Unit Stadler Flirts. They will operate as 14 three-car and 24 four-car sets

Stadler is to enter the UK mainline passenger rolling stock market for the first time with an planned order for 383 Flirt electro-diesel and electric multiple-unit cars.
http://www.railwaygazette.com/news/pass ... chise.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Note: The Stadler DMUs and EMUs serving intercity and suburban trains while the Bombardier EMUs serving just suburban trains.

The Bi-Mode DMU-EMU Stadler Flirts are limited to 4 car sets (much like Fort Worth's recent order), but since they are multiple units, and can be formed into one 8 car train using two sets. It could be possible for two sets joined into one train from Montreal to Toronto, where it splits into two different trains - one heading to Sardinia and the other to Windsor - and vice versa.
Stadler has successfully set up shop in Salt Lake City for final assembly, the excreted aluminum shells are made in Switzerland. While they haven't set up shop in Canada yet, they seem willing to do so if it's needed to win a contract.
There are other Bi-Mode EMU-DMU train manufactures in Europe - but only one to date meets US FRA alternate compliance regulations. I'm pretty sure VIA might like them - although I don't think CN would approve of them on shared tracks...But VIA's future vision is to run passenger trains on their own dedicated tracks, in their own corridors or in shared corridors. That might change CN's tune?

I don't really understand the plan. For one, why dual modes? Either VIA is going to operating only fairly short distances under commuter wires or they'll be building the whole electric trunk that they're planning. Straight diesels or straight electrics would be cheaper and easier to procure. I suppose that they just can't wait for HrSR to be done, or maybe there are some unresolved gaps?