Alstom bags ₹947 crore Rolling Stock contract to supply 78 coaches for Chennai Metro

Chennai, India (Urban Transport News): The Chennai Metro Rail Limited (CMRL) has recently issued a letter of award worth Rs 946.92 crore in favour of Alstom Transport India for supply of 78 metro coaches (Package ARE03A) for Corridor 4 of Chennai Metro Rail Project, Phase 2. under Package ARE03A.

The scope of work includes design, manufacture, supply, testing, commissioning of standard gauge metro rolling stock (electrical multiple units) and training of personnel for Chennai Metro Project Phase II.

The final contract value is Rs. 946,92,55,624.00 (INR 7,31,25,53,552 + EURO 2,36,01,312 + SEK 2,02,10,441) according to the notice of award issued by the Chennai Metro Rail Ltd. Alstom has to supply the 26 trainsets of 3 coaches to CMRL in 1960 days. These trains will be deployed on 26.1 km corridor 4 of Phase 2 of Chennai Metro Rail Project and will be maintained at Poonamallee Depot.

These trains will be in a DMC + TC + DMC configuration with the ability to operate at Grade of Automation level-4 for “driverless” Unattended Train Operations (UTO). Alstom will manufacturer these coaches at their Sri City Coach Facility Centre in Andhra Pradesh, India.

These three-coach trains with a total length about 66 metres, can carry about 900 passengers at a time. This is in contrast to Phase I project trains where CMRL opted for four-coach trains with a capacity of 1,200 people. Later, CMRL will convert these trains from three coaches to six coaches to fulfill furture demands.

A total of three bidders - Alstom Transport India, BEML and Titagarh Wagons - were participated in the tendering process. 

“Though this tender had to be finalised a few months ago, there were some issues that had to be ironed out. Fresh tenders were floated and Alstom was the lowest bidder. We will formally award the contract to the firm within a few weeks,” said an official.

Rolling stock contracts for the other two remaining corridors i.e. Corridor 3 (Madhavaram to SIPCOT) and Corridor 5 (Madhavaram to Shollinganallur) have not yet finalised.