12.05.09
FLIRT starts in Algeria
The opening of the first section of the Algiers rapid transit system was celebrated by state President Abdelaziz Bouteflika on 02.05.09. The Stadler FLIRTs have been running on timetable in Algeria since 03.05.09. The official opening was kept to a small scale for security reasons. Stadler Rail received the order from the Algerian national railways SNTF for 64 FLIRTs at a value of around CHF 600 million in 2006.
SNTF gave Stadler Rail the order for 64 four-unit FLIRTs (Fast Light Innovative Regional Trains) after an international tender competition in spring 2006. At that time, it was the largest single order that Stadler Rail had won. To date, 22 of the 64 FLIRTs have already been delivered to SNTF. The full delivery will be completed by the end of 2010. The trains are transported from the Stadler factory in Bussnang TG by rail to the northern Italian port of Savona. Tracks have been laid there to the ferry dock especially for this purpose. The FLIRTs are shipped to Algiers by a direct ferry link.
The Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika fired the starting gun for timetable operation on 02.05.09. The celebration was kept to a small scale because such events are not announced in advance in Algeria for security reasons. The trains that have already been delivered are running on the Algiers – Al-Affroun and Algiers – Thenia lines.
In addition to this order for the supply of the trains, Stadler Rail also has a contract with SNTF for a further 10 years to provide maintenance for the trains. Stadler has constructed its own service centre in Algeria especially for this purpose and will employ around 30 people locally.
Stadler Rail Group, the provider of customised system solutions for railed vehicle construction, has sites in Switzerland at Altenrhein, Bussnang and Winterthur, in Germany at Berlin-Pankow and Velten, in Poland at Siedlce, in Hungary at Budapest, Pusztascabolcz and Szolnok and in Algeria at Algiers. The group employs more than 2,400 men and women. The best-known families of vehicles produced by the Stadler Rail Group are the GTW articulated power units with 453 trains sold, the Regio Shuttle RS1 with 402 trains sold, the FLIRT with 515 trains sold and the DOSTO double-deck rapid transit trains, of which 50 have been sold in the railway segment and the Variobahn, with sales of 255 vehicles and the newly developed Tango, with 90 vehicles sold in the tramway segment. Stadler also produces carriages and diesel-electric locomotives and is the world’s leading producer of rack-and-pinion railway vehicles.
For further details please contact:
Stadler Rail Group
Tim Büchele, Media spokesman
Telephone ++41 (0) 71 / 626 31 57
Mobile: ++41 (0) 79 / 765 49 31
tim.buechele@stadlerrail.ch