The federal government announced this Wednesday the tender for the acquisition of a fleet of the first 15 electric trains for the Mexico City-Pachuca route, which will serve a daily passenger demand in one hour and 15 minutes, making it one of the railway sections currently under construction that will generate the most trips.
The call for tenders will be published this Thursday, July 10, while the decision will be made at the end of August, reported Andrés Lajous Loaeza, head of the Railway Transport Regulatory Agency of the Ministry of Infrastructure, Communications, and Transportation (SICT).
The trains
Each train will have capacity for more than 700 passengers with at least 315 ergonomic seats. It will have a speed of 130 kilometers per hour and a length of 100 meters, allowing two units to be coupled together.
In addition to universal level accessibility and priority seating, it will also offer passenger information and communication, as well as safety and comfort.
Hidalgo, raise your hand
Previously, both the governor of Hidalgo, Julio Menchaca Salazar, and the business sector in the state, emphasized that the Ciudad Sahagún industrial zone has the capacity to build the AIFA-Pachuca trains and other railway projects.
Bombardier, an Alstom partner, as well as ASF-K of Mexico, which manufactures components for the railway industry, and Greenbrier, a supplier of rail cars and parts for the railway industry, are eligible to participate, they noted.
It should be noted that as part of the construction of the Maya Train, the previous federal government administration signed the acquisition of 42 trains with 210 rail cars from Bombardier, an Alstom partner, at its Ciudad Sahagún plant, for the purchase of rolling stock and rail systems in 2022 for a total of 36.6 billion pesos.
The Ciudad Sahagún plant is one of the most emblematic railway construction sites in Mexico. It has 464,515 square meters, and between 1998 and 2015, more than 2,000 locomotives were manufactured there. As a precedent, Bombardier manufactured 45 trains and 400 cars for the Mexico City Metro more than 20 years ago.
In this context, Ciudad Sahagún can manufacture the cars for the Mexico City-Pachuca train, as well as the entire rail network announced by the federal government, after the Mayan Train was built there, Menchaca Salazar previously emphasized.
“We have formally requested this from President Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo; it is a decision that has to do with many other variables,” he stated in a previous interview.
Mobility
During a conference at the National Palace, Lajous Loaeza explained that the Mexico City-Pachuca train is the section with the highest demand among the rail projects under construction, due to the daily commute of the population from home to work.
She explained that in the Tizayuca region and the Pachuca metropolitan area, commuters frequently travel to Mexico City, whether for work, school, or home. Therefore, the train’s purpose is to improve travel times and offer schedule certainty.
The federal government is requesting that the builders submit a final project that includes technical specifications for materials, construction processes, and rail systems. During the construction phase, they must carry out preliminary works and earthworks. The testing phase includes statistical and dynamic testing of the track, as well as structural and load verification.
Work Continues
Meanwhile, President Claudia Sheinbaum noted that the AIFA-Pachuca train section is under construction and added that next week the Ministries of National Defense, as well as Infrastructure, Communications, and Transportation, will report on the progress of the project.
“The rescue of passenger trains continues. The period in which people said the state could not build, that public infrastructure was bad, is over,” the president said.
Source: milenio
