ITALY: Hitachi Rail has delivered the first of 14 latest generation metro trainsets to Genova, the municipality reported on May 31.
The vehicles are to be used to expand the capacity of the city’s automated light metro line, which is currently being extended at both ends.
Ordered at a cost of €70m, the articulated four-car trains are similar to seven sets ordered from AnsaldoBreda (now Hitachi Rail) in 2012. Each 39 m long trainset will be carried on three powered and two unpowered bogies, and provide capacity for up to 290 passengers, including two wheelchair spaces. The air-conditioned units are intended to operate in coupled pairs, and will also be able to run in multiple with the earlier sets.
The trainsets are equipped with onboard ATP and ATO equipment. They also feature audiovisual passenger information systems, CCTV and air-conditioning.
The entry to service of the new vehicles will also allow the withdrawal of the six first-generation trainsets, manufactured by Breda, which entered service in 1990, lowering the average age of the fleet from 18·5 years to 9·8 years.
‘The tailor-made trainsets, built in the Pistoia plant, are designed for the particular shape of our metro line’s tunnels’, commented Matteo Campora, Councillor for Transport & Integrated Mobility at the municipality. He added that the work to expand the metro network is continuing. Construction of an infill station at Piazza Corvetto is under way, as are a northern one-station extension to Canepari and the eastern one-station extension to Piazza Martinez. The preparatory works for the start of the extension to Rivarolo main line station further north are also in progress.
- Liguria’s Councillor for Transport Augusto Sartori has said that Hitachi Rail had delivered 45 out of the 48 Rock double-deck electric multiple-units on order for the region for use by national passenger operator Trenitalia.
